China’s Genocide of the Uighurs

The Newslines Institute for Strategy and Public Policy launched an independent probe into the allegations of genocide of the Uighurs in Xinjiang, China. The report they released states that there is a clear intent by the Chinese Government to destroy the Uighurs and that China has violated all five clauses of the United Nations’ genocide code. The United Nations defines genocide as:

Among the heinous crimes that the international community accused the People’s Republic of China is the mass sterilization of  Uighur women, detaining Uighurs in internment camps, the mass rape of female prisoners, placement in reeducation camps, and separating children from their families. 

Who are the Uighurs?

The Uighurs, are an ethnic and religious minority who are primarily Muslim, with a population of approximately 12 million people who reside in the Xinjiang region of China. Uighurs speak the Uighur language, which is a subgroup of the Turkish Language group. The Uighur consider themselves Central Asain, not Chinses. Recently, the Han began to settle areas in Xinjiang that traditionally belong to the Uighurs. 

The Violations of International Law and Genocide in China

The People’s Republic of China’s population control policy requires that Uighur women undergo sterilization or have a birth control device implanted in them limit the population of the Uighur in China. The Chinese Government forcibly implants Uighur women with birth control devices  and separates Uighur children from their parents for “reeducation.” Reeducation camps indoctrinate Uighur children in communist doctrine. The Uighur population rates have dropped by 84 % since 2015 when the People’s Republic of China began its crackdown on the Uighurs of Xinjiang. 

According to a BBC report, Uighur women who refuse abortion risk arrest for exceeding birth quotas. Uighur women who escaped the internment camps claimed that masked Chinese guards took women into ” black rooms” where they rape, sexually abuse, and torture them. The Chinese police forced women to bind and undress the victims then proceed to rape them. The women were taken back to their cells, then forced to sit quietly, and warned not to speak about it. The trauma from these brutal assaults drove some women mad. 

Chinese detention officers used sexual abuse, rape, and torture to break the spirits of Uighur detainees.  Uighur women reported incidents of gang rape and electrocution by the Chinese Police Officers.  In the BBC report, a woman told the BBC that she witness a 21-year-old woman get brutally raped in front of the other detainees to elicit a confession. These are just some of the horrors that await Uighur women who are sent to the internment camps. 

New Sanctions and the Conclusion 

The Chinese government denies the allegations in the reports. United Nations members are demanding that China give them complete access to Xinjiang, so the UN High Commissioner of Human Rights can conduct a proper investigation into the human rights violations. Western nations accused China of using its permanent place on the UN Security Council and to block attempts at investigating the situation in Xinjiang. In response, the European Union, the United States of America, Canada, the United Kingdom brought sanctions against China in response to the genocide of the Uighurs. This is the first time since 1989 that the European Union placed new sanctions on China. The Chinese fired back with their own sanctions.