F. whereas Tashi Wangchuk, a Tibetan shopkeeper and language rights advocate, was detained on 27 January 2016 after he appeared in a New York Times video advocating the right of Tibetans to learn and study in their mother tongue; whereas in March 2016 Tashi Wangchuk was charged with ‘inciting separatism’ and faces up to 15 years in prison, although he told the newspaper explicitly that he was not calling for Tibetan independence; G. whereas in 2015 the Tibetan monk Choekyi, from Phurbu monastery in Sichuan’s Seda county, was jailed for celebrating the birthday of exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama; whereas after being charged, Choekyi was briefly held in a prison in Kangding county in Ganzi prefecture, and was finally sent to Sichuan’s Mianyang prison to serve a fouryear term; whereas according to media sources, Choekyi had kidney problems, jaundice, and other health-related issues which got worse because of his detention; H. whereas human rights lawyers have continued to face intimidation and imprisonment, as in the cases of prominent lawyers Li Yuhan, who has been incommunicado since November 2017, and Wang Quanzhang, who was arrested in July 2015, held incommunicado for over 800 days and reportedly subjected to torture; whereas human rights defenders who are petitioners who travel to major cities to raise local issues face detention and imprisonment, as with Li Xiaoling, who has been in detention since June 2017 while continuing to suffer from a severe case of glaucoma; whereas human rights defenders who provide a platform for petitioners and other human rights defenders, such as Ding Lingjie, Liu Feiyue and Zhen Jianghua, have also been detained; I. whereas the Chinese Government has passed new laws, notably the State Security Law, the Counterterrorism Law, the Cybersecurity Law, and the Foreign NGO Management Law, that cast public activism and peaceful criticism of the government as state security threats, strengthen censorship, surveillance and the control of individuals and social groups, and deter individuals from campaigning for human rights; J. whereas in the EU Strategic Framework and Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy, the Council pledges that the EU will promote democracy, the rule of law and ‘human rights in all areas of its external action without exception’ and will ‘place human rights at the centre of its relations with all third countries, including its strategic partners’; 1. Remains highly concerned by the Chinese Government’s approach towards human rights defenders, activists and lawyers; reminds China of its responsibilities as a global power and calls on the Beijing authorities to ensure in all circumstances respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights instruments signed or ratified by China; urges the Beijing authorities, moreover, to put an end to all acts of harassment against all human rights defenders in the country so that they are able to carry out their work without hindrance; 2. Urges the Chinese authorities to release immediately and unconditionally all human rights defenders, activists, lawyers, journalists and petitioners being detained for their human rights work, and to end the ongoing crackdown against them, which is being perpetrated in the form of detention, judicial harassment and intimidation; 3. Calls on the Government of the People’s Republic of China to release Wu Gan