China has possibly committed “genocide” in its treatment of Uighurs and other minority Muslims in its western region of Xinjiang, the US Congressional-Executive Commission on China said in a report on Thursday.
The bipartisan commission said that new evidence had last year emerged that “crimes against humanity — and possibly genocide — are occurring” in Xinjiang. It also accused China of harassing Uighurs in the US.
China has been widely condemned for setting up complexes in Xinjiang that it describes as “vocational training centers” to stamp out extremism and give people new skills, which others have called concentration camps.
Photo: AFP
The UN says that at least 1 million Uighurs and other Muslims have been detained in Xinjiang. Faith leaders, activist groups and others have said that crimes against humanity, including genocide, are taking place there.
Beijing denies the accusations and the Chinese embassy in Washington said that the commission was “obsessed with making up all sorts of lies to vilify China.”
“The so-called ‘genocide’ is a rumor deliberately started by some anti-China forces and a farce to discredit China,” an embassy spokesperson said.
The report called for a formal US “determination on whether atrocities are being committed” in Xinjiang, something required within 90 days of US legislation passed on Dec. 27 last year.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in his final days in office before US president-elect Joe Biden succeeds US President Donald Trump on Wednesday next week, has already been weighing a determination. However, given the current turmoil in Washington, officials have played down the possibility of an announcement before that.
US Representative Jim McGovern, a Democrat who cochairs the commission, called China’s actions to crush human rights “shocking and unprecedented” and urged Congress and the incoming Biden administration to hold Beijing accountable.
“The United States must continue to stand with the people of China in their struggle, and lead the world in a united and coordinated response to the human rights abuses of the Chinese government,” he said.
In Trump’s last year in power, relations between the world’s two biggest economies have plunged to their lowest level in decades with disagreements on issues including human rights, the COVID-19 pandemic, trade and espionage.
Experts say that a US genocide determination would be an enormous embarrassment for China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
It could also pose problems for Biden by complicating his dealings with Beijing, although his campaign had before the US presidential election in November last year declared that genocide was occurring in Xinjiang.
In October, US National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said that Beijing was perpetrating “something close to” genocide, and other US officials have referred to concentration camps in Xinjiang.
Under international law, crimes against humanity are defined as widespread and systematic, whereas the burden of proof for genocide — the intent to destroy part of a population — can be more difficult to obtain.
Expectations that Pompeo might declare genocide were raised in June when he labeled as “shocking” and “disturbing” reports that China was using forced sterilization, forced abortion and coercive family planning against Muslims.
He was referring to a report about Xinjiang by German researcher Adrian Zenz, which the commission report also cited.
Zenz had said that his findings represented the strongest evidence yet that Beijing’s Xinjiang policies met one of the criteria cited in the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, namely “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the [targeted] group.”
A US genocide declaration would mean that countries would have to think hard about allowing firms to do business in Xinjiang, a leading global supplier of cotton. It would also raise pressure for further US sanctions.
On Wednesday, US Customs and Border Protection said that the US was imposing a region-wide ban on all cotton and tomato products from Xinjiang over allegations that they are made with forced labor by detained Uighurs.
School bullies in Singapore are to face caning under new guidelines, but the education minister on Tuesday said it would be meted out only as a last resort with strict safeguards. Human rights groups regularly criticize Singapore for the use of corporal punishment, which remains part of the school and criminal justice systems, but authorities have defended it as a deterrent to crime and serious misconduct. Caning was discussed in the parliament after legislators asked how it would be used in relation to bullying in schools. The debate followed stricter guidelines on serious student misconduct, including bullying, unveiled by the Singaporean Ministry of
‘GROSS NEGLIGENCE?’ Despite a spleen typically being significantly smaller than a liver, the surgeon said he believed Bryan’s spleen was ‘double the size of what is normal’ A Florida surgeon who is facing criminal charges after allegedly removing a patient’s liver instead of his spleen has said he is “forever traumatized” by that person’s death. In a deposition from November last year that was recently obtained by NBC, 44-year-old Thomas Shaknovsky described the death of 70-year-old William Bryan as an “incredibly unfortunate event that I regret deeply.” Bryan died after the botched surgery; and last month, a grand jury in Tallahassee indicted Shaknovsky on a charge of manslaughter. “I’m forever traumatized by it and hurt by it,” Shaknovsky added, also saying that wrong-site surgeries can happen “during
A MESSAGE: Japan’s participation in the Balikatan drills is a clear deterrence signal to China not to attack Taiwan while the US is busy in the Middle East, an analyst said The Japan Self-Defense Forces yesterday fired a Type 88 anti-ship missile during a joint maritime exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces, hitting a decommissioned Philippine Navy ship in waters facing the disputed South China Sea, in drills that underscore Tokyo’s rising willingness to project military power on China’s doorstep. The drill took place as Manila and Tokyo began talks on a potential defense equipment transfer, made possible by Japan’s decision to scrap restrictions on military exports. The discussions include the possible early transfer of Abukuma-class destroyers and TC-90 aircraft to the Philippines, Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. Philippine Secretary of
A South Korean judge who last week more than doubled former South Korean first lady Kim Keon-hee’s prison sentence was found dead yesterday, police said. Shin Jong-o was found unconscious at about 1am at the Seoul High Court building, an investigator at the Seocho District Police Station in Seoul said. Shin was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead, he said. “There is no sign of foul play in the death,” the investigator added. Local media reported that Shin had left a suicide note, but the investigator said there was none. On Tuesday last week, Shin presided over 53-year-old Kim’s appeal trial, finding her guilty
RSS