UN Authority Figures

UN Development Programme (UNDP)
Executive Board: China

Pu Zhiqiang, one of China's best known and most outspoken human rights lawyers, was formally charged on May 15, 2015, planting another milestone in the government's relentless crackdown on free expression. Since President Xi Jinping took office in 2012, nearly 2,000 human rights and other political activists have been detained and 1,000 arrested. Picture: Pu Zhiqiang.
Source: Christian Science Monitor, May 15, 2015

Mission of the UN Development Programme: "UNDP works in nearly 170 countries and territories, helping to achieve the eradication of poverty, and the reduction of inequalities and exclusion... UNDP focuses on helping countries build and share solutions in three main areas: Sustainable development; Democratic governance and peacebuilding; Climate and disaster resilience." (UN Development Programme website, "Overview")

Term of office: 2017-2019, Re-elected 2020-2022

China's Record on "democratic governance and peacebuilding":
"The People's Republic of China (PRC) is an authoritarian state in which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is the paramount authority. CCP members hold almost all top government and security apparatus positions. Ultimate authority rests with the 25-member Political Bureau (Politburo) of the CCP and its seven-member Standing Committee... Repression and coercion were routine, particularly against organizations and individuals involved in civil and political rights advocacy and public interest issues, ethnic minorities, and law firms that took on sensitive cases. Officials continued to employ harassment, intimidation, and prosecution of family members and associates to retaliate against rights advocates and defenders. Individuals and groups regarded as politically sensitive by authorities continued to face tight restrictions on their freedom to assemble, practice religion, and travel. Authorities resorted to extralegal measures such as enforced disappearance and strict house arrest, including house arrest of family members, to prevent public expression of independent opinions... As in previous years, citizens did not have the right to change their government, and citizens had limited forms of redress against official abuse. Other human rights problems during the year included alleged extrajudicial killings, including executions without due process; enforced disappearance and incommunicado detention, including prolonged illegal detentions at unofficial holding facilities known as "black jails"; torture and coerced confessions of prisoners; detention and harassment of lawyers, journalists, writers, bloggers, dissidents, petitioners, and others who sought to exercise peacefully their rights under the law; a lack of due process in judicial proceedings; political control of courts and judges; closed trials; the use of administrative detention; restrictions on freedom to assemble, practice religion, and travel..."
(U.S. State Department's Country Report on Human Rights Practices 2014, China)