Group: Uighur
Country: China
Date Finalized: 10/19/21
Team: Ann Thomas (Lead), Gabriel Cardenas, Nichole Dahlen, Nuri Son
There is substantial evidence to conclude the Uighur have been subject to ethnocide, being forced into labor and reeducation camps in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of China. The overall data quality is a 2, with many sources discussing the issue.
The Uighurs in China are a group of Turkic-speaking people who are native to the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region in Northwest China. The Uighurs have been subject to ethnocide. In 2014, the Chinese government began detaining more than a million Uighurs in internment camps in the Xinjiang region. China states that these camps exist for “re-education” for Uighurs and other minority groups (Maizland, 2021). They claim that the purpose of these camps is to re-educate Uighurs who hold extremist and separatist ideas which pose a threat to the country (Maizland, 2021). People who have escaped report experiences of torture, forced labor, mass rape, sexual abuse, and cruel punishments (Hill et al., 2021). The detainees are forced to spend hours “singing patriotic Chinese songs and watching patriotic TV programs about Chinese President Xi Jinping” (Hill et al., 2021). If they fail to properly engage in the “education “process, they are punished with food deprivation and beatings (BBC News, 2021). The Chinese government believes that the religion of Islam in Xinjiang is extremist due to protests and movements that the Uighurs have held in the past which sometimes resulted in violence and death (Maizland, 2021).
Sources
- Maizland, L. 2021. China’s Repression of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. Council on Foreign Relations. Retrieved October 5, 2021, from https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-repression-uyghurs-xinjiang
- Hill M, Campanale D and Gunter J. “Their goal is to destroy everyone”: Uighur camp detainees allege systematic rape. (2021, February 2). BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55794071