High Court to follow through on arrest warrants against top Chinese officials

Despite global pressure and objections by prosecutors, the High Court on Thursday said it would go ahead with its international arrest warrants for former Chinese President Jiang Zemin, ex-Prime Minister Li Peng and a host of other officials from China, who are wanted for human rights abuses in Tibet.

The warrants, which were ordered by Judge Ismael Moreno on November 18, are the subject of a diplomatic row between Spain and China in which Beijing has been pressuring the conservative Popular Party (PP) government to step in and block the High Court’s investigation into allegedly genocidal policies applied in Tibet.

Last month, the (PP) filed a bill in Congress to restrict the Spanish judiciary from carrying out international prosecutions based on the universal justice doctrine. The proposed reform to the judicial code has come under fire by the opposition, legal experts and human rights organizations which fear that it will affect future cases involving drug traffickers, child abuse, gender violence and female mutilation.

Besides Jiang and Li, Moreno is also seeking the arrests of top Chinese military and Communist Party officials. The investigation stems from a complaint filed in 2006 by human rights organizations and Sherpa Thubten Wangchen, a Spanish national, over China’s attempt to "eliminate the singular nature and very existence of [...] Tibet itself.” The plaintiffs allege the Chinese leaders named in suit were responsible for “genocide, crimes against humanity, torture and terrorism” against Tibetans in the 1980s and 1990s

Last month, prosecutors asked the criminal section of the High Court to quash the warrants, arguing that they were causing “substantial uneasiness” with the Chinese government. A judge’s panel rejected the prosecutors’ petition on Wednesday and ordered Judge Moreno to draft his writ of execution to back up the warrants.