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Chinese government had the “intent to destroy” the Uyghur and other Turkic populations in East Turkistan and committed genocide in clear violation of international law, a new report by 50 global experts on genocide studies said on Tuesday.
The report published by a non-partisan US-based thinktank, the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy said that the Chinese Communist Party “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) based on an extensive review of the available evidence and application of international law to the evidence of the facts on the ground.”
“This report concludes, based on a clear and convincing standard of proof, that China is responsible for breaches of each provision of Article II of the Convention,” the report said.
According to the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, experts on genocide studies, East Turkistan, international law, and Chinese ethnic policies participated in examining available evidence collected, including testimonies of victims and witnesses, satellite imagery analysis, public Chinese State communications, leaked Chinese government documents, and analysis of information from various sources.
The report doesn’t make any recommendations for action, it, however, makes it very clear, through evidence, that the Chinese state is engaged in systematic genocide against Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples.
Since January 21, 2021, the US Government, the Parliaments of Canada, and the Netherlands have officially recognised China’s atrocities against the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan as genocide.
The report cited that the genocide exacerbated with President Xi Jinping launching the “People’s War on Terror” in 2014 against the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan.
Top government officials responded to Xi by issuing orders to “round up everyone who should be rounded up,’ ‘wipe them out completely … destroy them root and branch,’ and ‘break their lineage, break their roots, break their connections, and break their origins”.
The government officials described the Uyghurs in “dehumanising terms and repeatedly likened the mass internment of Uyghurs to ‘eradicating tumours’”.
The report also highlighted the estimated Uyghurs in internment camps – 1-2 million, which the US Department of Defense described as upwards of 3 million people in concentration camps.
The report pointed out that Uyghur detainees within the detention sites are systematically tortured, subjected to sexual violence, including rape, and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment or punishment, deprived of their basic human needs and severely humiliated.
“China’s policies and practices targeting Uyghurs in the region must be viewed in their totality, which amounts to an intent to destroy the Uyghurs as a group, in whole or in substantial part, as such,” the report read.
“The intent to destroy the Uyghurs as a group is further demonstrated by the Government’s deliberate targeting of the guardians and transmitters of Uyghur identity for prolonged detention or death, including household heads, intellectuals, and cultural leaders, regardless of Party affiliation or educational status… The intent to destroy the Uyghurs as a group is further demonstrated by the comprehensive Government policies and programs directed at erasing all aspects of Uyghur identity, community, and domestic life, and institutionalizing Uyghur children in state-run orphanages,” it added.
“China is engaging in genocide, as defined under The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948), against Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan (renamed Xinjiang),” said the East Turkistan Government in Exile (ETGE) Prime Minister Salih Hudayar. “The international community must fulfill its obligations and act to end China’s ongoing genocide.”
The ETGE urged all governments worldwide to recognise the genocide and take swift action to end it.
“We call on the United States to bring the East Turkistan issue to the agenda of the UN Security Council and lead the world in taking meaningful action, in accordance to the UN Genocide Convention and the UN’s Responsibility to Protect Commitment, to bring a swift end to China’s genocide in East Turkistan,” said ETGE President Ghulam Osman Yaghma.
The ETGE also urged governments worldwide to boycott the 2022 Beijing Olympics, grant refuge to Uyghurs, and others fleeing the genocide in East Turkistan, and provide diplomatic and political support to the East Turkistan Government in Exile on the international stage.
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