{"id":4323,"date":"2018-10-28T17:37:47","date_gmt":"2018-10-28T17:37:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iuhrdf.org\/en\/2018\/10\/28\/chinas-latest-spin-its-mass-crackdown-uyghur-muslims\/"},"modified":"2018-10-28T17:37:47","modified_gmt":"2018-10-28T17:37:47","slug":"chinas-latest-spin-its-mass-crackdown-uyghur-muslims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/chinas-latest-spin-its-mass-crackdown-uyghur-muslims\/","title":{"rendered":"China’s latest spin on its mass crackdown on Uyghur Muslims"},"content":{"rendered":"
Camps? What camps? Despite an overwhelming amount of evidence \u2013 including first-hand testimony and satellite images with clearly visible fences and guard towers \u2013 China has been denying for months that it has been rounding up Muslims in the western province of Xinjiang.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

The stories of those who have emerged from the camps \u2013 thought to hold as many as a million people \u2013 are chilling, describing Chinese Government efforts to overwrite Muslim beliefs with single-hearted love for the Communist Party. There are reports of having to eat pork and drink alcohol, of men having to shave off beards, of efforts to cure the \u201cideological illness\u201d of Islam.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

However, this month has seen a remarkable about-turn. Not only has the Chinese Government <\/span><\/span>legalised<\/span> the camps, <\/span>it\u2019s<\/span> come out with a full-throated <\/span>defence<\/span> of the system, saying that it has created \u201cvocational and educational training <\/span>centres<\/span><\/span>\u201d to teach skills to ethnic minorities, mostly Uyghurs and Kazakhs, and stop them falling into \u201creligious extremism\u201d.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

To hammer home the point, state television ran a documentary showing supposedly happy Uyghurs learning how to bake and build, how to speak the \u201ccommon language\u201d of China and singing Party songs. They play volleyball in the sunshine in their spare time. Their children get free schooling.<\/span><\/span>There\u2019s<\/span> free nutritious meals and free lodging \u2013 in the same <\/span>way<\/span><\/span> that prison can be described as free. The footage even showed the numerous security cameras keeping a close watch on the \u201ctrainees\u201d. The documentary did not, however, show the barbed wire that\u2019s visible from satellite images.<\/span><\/span>It\u2019s all about terrorism, according to the authorities. Nothing to do with religion, of course, a religion that might interfere with the worship of the communist apparatus. These \u201cvocational <\/span><\/span>centres<\/span><\/span>\u201d have been set up \u201cto get rid of the environment and soil that breeds terrorism and religious extremism and stop violent terrorist activities from happening\u201d, a senior regional official, himself ethnically Uyghur, told China\u2019s main state-run news agency. It\u2019s all \u201cpeople-oriented\u201d, you see.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Government in Beijing has clearly given up trying to deny the existence of these camps and is now trying to put a spin on them. This latest version is hardly more convincing than the denials. But, it shows that international pressure on the Chinese Government over the camps may just be beginning to have an impact. Human-rights activists have now been joined by US congressional representatives and Vice-President Mike Pence, a man not known for his <\/span><\/span>defence<\/span><\/span> of Muslims. \u201cIn Xinjiang, the Communist Party has imprisoned as many as one million Muslim Uyghurs in Government camps where they endure around-the-clock brainwashing,\u201d Pence said in a speech earlier this month. \u201cSurvivors of the camps have described their experiences as a deliberate attempt by Beijing to strangle Uyghur culture and stamp out the Muslim faith.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The inclusion of this issue in Pence\u2019s wide-ranging condemnation of China hints at a broader strategy: in its effort to rein in China and its more nefarious practices, the Trump administration isn\u2019t limiting itself to trade. It\u2019s looking for every opportunity to <\/span><\/span>criticise<\/span><\/span> China. That makes the Xinjiang camps low-hanging fruit.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAs history attests,\u201d Pence continued, \u201ca country that oppresses its own people rarely stops there.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

But, here in China, defenders of the Government see this as just another outside effort to thwart its rightful return to world-superpower status. \u201cThe West just cares about finding faults with China and accusing us [of] nonexistent wrongdoings,\u201d said Hu Xijin, the influential editor of the nationalist Global Times<\/em> tabloid, which accuses Western countries of trying to put pressure on China on the world stage.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Or, to borrow, a phrase: It\u2019s all just \u201cfake news.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

New Zealander Anna Fifield is Beijing bureau chief for the Washington Post.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This article was first published in the November 3, 2018<\/a> issue of the New Zealand Listener.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Camps? What camps? Despite an overwhelming amount of evidence \u2013 including first-hand testimony and satellite images with clearly visible fences and guard towers \u2013 China has been denying for months…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-4323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4323\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4323"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=4323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}