The Uyghur Genocide is widely used to describe the human rights abuses the Chinese government has committed against the Uyghur people and other groups in Xinjiang, China since 2014. Here, Roy Williams looks at the history and the current status of the cultural genocide.
In the past I have focused my attention on studying and advocating for the recognition of genocides that have been carried out in the last century. As a historian and a genocide scholar I would not be worth the words I have written if I did not speak of genocide of the present day. The communist government of China under the leadership of Xi Jinping is currently engaged in a cultural genocide against the Uyghur Muslims of the province of Xinjiang. Nearly one million Uyghur Muslims are currently detained in concentration camps throughout the province in an effort by the communist Chinese government to destroy their cultural and religious identity in hopes of creating a monoculture based around Han Chinese ideology and racial identity. Due to the Han supremacist bent of the Chinese government and the Uyghur desire for autonomy, the government has implemented multiple human rights abuses in the name of cleansing resistance and promoting the Chinese Han monoculture of their modern empire.
When studying genocide, the reader is always faced with emotions of disbelief in wondering how humanity could allow such grievous human rights abuses to occur. The Uyghur genocide provides a poignant example in understanding how a genocide can occur with very little active resistance from the international community. While humans rights advocates and journalists may proclaim the cry of genocide in hopes of drawing action against the crimes of an authoritarian regime, the politics of inaction and self interest halt any meaningful actions by the international community in condemning and halting a genocide. If the reader takes anything from this article, I plead that they hear the plight of the Uyghur people persecuted by their government and demand action from the international community.
Background
The story of the Uyghur genocide began with expansion westward under the Manchu led Qing dynasty of China during the 1700s. The Uyghur people of Xinjiang regained independence during the Dungan revolt from 1862 to 1877. During the Republican era of China, the Uyghur people largely retained autonomy. After communism became the prevailing government ideology of China, the Chinese government began sponsoring mass migration of Han Chinese to Xinjiang to dilute the population of ethnic Uyghurs. The communist Chinese government also began to introduce programs to suppress the religious and ethnic identity of Uyghur Muslims in opposition to the ideology of the Soviet Union.
The 1980s saw a change in government policy under Deng Xiaoping, attempting a looser society allowing for the acceptance of ethnic minorities and multiple cultures under the Chinese banner. This policy, while lauded by ethnic minorities, was ultimately deemed a failure by government officials of the politburo. Government policy of the province of Xinjiang ultimately directed its efforts against accepting cultural minorities in favor of a Han Chinese monoculture that sought to limit and suppress Uyghur Muslim cultural identity. Following a protest by Uyghurs rejecting mass Chinese Han migration to Xinjiang in the Barin township in 1990, the Chinese People’s liberation Army put down Uyghur protests with excessive cruelty resulting in the deaths of 15 Uyghurs. Uyghur sources claim that the protest originated from mandated forced Chinese abortions of 200 Uyghur women, attempting to limit Uyghur birth rates. The varying accounts relaying the cause of the protest largely exist from the Chinese government’s commitment to spreading false pro-government propaganda in defending their heinous persecution of the Uyghur Muslims.
2014 campaign
In an effort to capitalize on the international war on terror, the Chinese government in 2014 sponsored the Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism as an excuse to persecute Uyghur Muslims in hopes of assimilating their culture into the larger dominant monoculture of the Han Chinese. Currently under this program over 1 million Uyghurs reside in concentration camps dedicated to stamping out Uyghur culture and religious practices. The Chinese government denied the existence of such camps until recently and now claims that they exist for vocational training and eliminating extremist and separatist political motivations in Xinjiang. Under the leadership of Xi Jinping, Jinping has directed government officials to show “Absolutely no mercy”, in dealing with Uyghur resistance. Accounts from Uyghurs detained in camps tell a different story describing rampant physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. Uyghur survivor Ziawudun recounts her traumatic experiences within a Chinese concentration camp: “They wore suits”, she said, “not police uniforms.”
Sometime after midnight, they came to the cells to select the women they wanted and took them down the corridor to a "black room", where there were no surveillance cameras.
Several nights, Ziawudun said, they took her.
"Perhaps this is the most unforgettable scar on me forever," she said.
"I don't even want these words to spill from my mouth."
"The woman took me to the room next to where the other girl had been taken in. They had an electric stick, I didn't know what it was, and it was pushed inside my genital tract, torturing me with an electric shock."
The culture of torture and sexual abuse are used to dehumanize and destroy the Uyghur people and culture. Survivors of the reeducation camps have described how those who attempted to pray were beaten mercilessly. Women have been forced to have abortions or been sterilized to reduce the Uyghur population in favor of Han Chinese migration. Nearly one sixth of all mosques in China have been destroyed by the Chinese government with the aim to stamp out Islamic cultural identity, with estimates of the destruction hovering at over 16,000 mosques. One of the most grievous crimes against ethnic and religious minorities is China’s recent destruction of the tomb of Imam Asim, which for Uyghurs existed as a substitute for the pilgrimage to Mecca. Education efforts by the Chinese government aim to separate Uyghur children from their families, brainwash them to revere the communist authoritarian leadership of China, learn Han Chinese to forget their Uyghur language, and reject their religious heritage of Islam for state atheism. Religious clothing is also strictly discouraged as well as giving children Islamic names. Names currently banned in the province of Xinjiang by the Chinese government include Mohammed, Quran, Mecca, Imam, Saddam, Hajj, and Medina. Uyghurs also face surveillance by a dystopian police state. Genetic material is collected to track and control the Uyghur population. Millions of cameras watch the people of Xinjiang criminalizing Uyghur cultural practices. Uyghur families are also forced to allow Chinese party officials constant access to their homes where they are actively monitored for extremist or separatist tendencies. "Their goal is to destroy everyone," proclaims Uyghur survivor Ziawudun.
Current status
While the United States and 38 other countries have condemned the Chinese governments for its crimes against humanity in perpetrating cultural genocide against the Uyghur people, the genocide persists. With the prospect of a dominant China in the 21st century, it is important for the international community to stand firm in its condemnation of China. Only through increased cooperation and retaliatory measures against the Chinese government can the Uyghur genocide be ended. Tech monopolies such as Facebook and Amazon stand squarely in the way of stopping China’s human rights abuses as they do not want to lose Chinese business in condemning their actions. Amazon’s heavy reliance on Chinese cotton, which is largely produced in the province of Xinjiang, stands as a massive economic barrier to stopping the Uyghur genocide. Facebook has allowed the Chinese government to buy ad space spewing government propaganda that denies the existence of the Uyghur genocide. "It's time our platform takes action to fight misinformation on the Uighur genocide," wrote one Facebook employee regarding the Chinese government’s use of Facebook ads in promoting denialist propaganda. Disney has also had an active role in supporting and denying the Uyghur genocide. During the filming of the recent Disney film, Mulan, multiple scenes were shot in the province of Xinjiang, sometimes in front of Uyghur concentration camps. In the final credits of Disney’s Mulan, multiple government agencies associated with the Uyghur genocide are thanked such as the publicity department of Xinjiang. China’s government is currently producing a propaganda film entitled the Wings of Song, which denies the existence of the Uyghur genocide in favor of nationalist pro-government falsehoods. With so many large companies enriching themselves at the expense of Uyghur suffering, the road to ending genocide appears to be long. Only through increased awareness and active condemnation by the international community can the Uyghur genocide and those who support it be stopped.
What do you think of the Uyghur cultural genocide? Let us know below.
Now, read Roy’s article on the Armenian Genocide here and the 1980s Guatemalan genocide here.
Bibliography
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-54064654
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55794071
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/02/china-uyghurs-abroad-living-in-fear/
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html
https://www.uyghurcongress.org/en/genocide-and-genocide-denial/
https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-internal-tension-china-xinjiang-ads-adverts-uyghurs-2021-4
