UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson...

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson said she would urge China not to use a war on terrorism to crack down on civil liberties and ethnic minorities, especially in its Muslim northwest.On her first visit to China since the September 11 attacks on the United States, Robinson also said she would press Beijing to set a date for a long-awaited visit by the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture."It is necessary to ensure that the requirement to combat terrorism is not used to clamp down on freedom of expression, legitimate dissent, freedom of association and so on," Robinson told Reuters in an interview."I'll particularly raise the problem of the Uighur people in Xinjiang and other individual cases," said Robinson, shortly before starting two days of talks with China's leadership, including President Jiang Zemin.China has called for international support for its campaign against ethnic Uighur Muslim separatists in the northwestern region of Xinjiang whom it says have links to Osama bin Laden, the man wanted by Washington for the September 11 attacks. But human rights groups, Uighurs overseas and Western experts on Xinjiang say most Uighur activists have no links with bin Laden and campaign peacefully for greater political, economic and religious freedoms.