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China’s abuses of its Uyghur population violate every article in the United Nations’ (UN) genocide definition, a new report claims.
The Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, a foreign policy think tank based in Washington, D.C., prepared the 55-page report. It is one of the think tank’s first independent reports into the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) actions in Xinjiang province.
The Uyghurs are an ethnic minority. The mostly Muslim group lives alongside other ethnic and religious minorities in the region.
“The Uyghur Genocide: An Examination of China’s Breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention,” report confirms Chinese authorities have created a massive network of internment camps in Xinjiang.
The camps are purportedly for “re-education” and “terrorism prevention.”
The report’s claims are unequivocal. It concludes “the People’s Republic of China (China) bears State responsibility for committing genocide against the Uyghurs in breach of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Genocide Convention) …”
The authors say they came to this conclusion after an “extensive” review of the available evidence and after applying “international law to the evidence of the facts on the ground.”
In 1948, the UN Genocide Convention designated five acts that would constitute “genocide.” The report says China has infringed in all five areas, quoting these as being:
killing members of the group
causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part
imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Committing just one act “with the requisite intent can sustain a finding of genocide,” the UN convention says.
Cam survivors report stories of Uyghur women being systematically raped, tortured and sterilised.
Forced birth control through use of intrauterine devices (IUD) has increased dramatically in Xinjiang while being on the decline throughout the rest of China.
Uyghur women’s formerly high fertility rates have seen precipitous drops in fertility in recent years.
Leaked manuals from the camps say wearing traditional clothing is among the “crimes” inmates can be detained for.
Chinese government officials have denied accusations of genocide. They insist the camps have helped prevent terrorism in the region.
China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi is calling the accusation of genocide “preposterous.” He says the report is “rumour fabricated with ulterior motives and a total lie.”
On Jan. 19, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared Chinese authorities had committed genocide against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang.
He cited forced labor, torture, forced abortion, sterilisations and birth control as some of the abuses behind his statement.
During his confirmation hearings, current US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that he agreed with Pompeo’s genocide assessment.
Source
- Catholic News Agency
- Image: Asia News
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News category: World.
