United Nations Human Rights

Council

Chinese Concentration

Camps for Muslim-

minority Uyghur

People Director: José Javier Iglesias Murrieta

Moderator: Andrea Navarro Millán

INTRODUCTION

In 2006, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) was founded by the

General Assembly to replace the former United Nations Commission on Human Rights. It was

established as an intergovernmental body responsible for

‘’strengthening the promotion and protection of human rights

around the globe and for addressing situations of human rights

violations and make recommendations of them’’ (United

Nations Human Rights Council, n.d.). It is currently conformed

by a 47-member body elected by the General Assembly, which

meets at the UN Office at Geneva, Switzerland (United Nations

Human Rights Council, n.d.).

Today, the Human Rights Council faces one of the most

challenging, controversial, but virtually inscrutable human rights violations in the modern

history of the United Nations: the existence of Chinese concentration camps aimed at its

Muslim-minority Uyghur population.

“Re Education” camps in Xinjiang

In 2017, news on Chinese authorities forcibly detaining Uyghur and Turkish Muslim

minorities raised concern over human rights violations. Satellite photos across the region of

Xinjiang later revealed the appearance of facilities built for

the purpose of “re-educating” detainees. Schools and other

official buildings, as well as recently built settlements were

used to hold over a million Muslims.

The government justified them by calling them

“counter extremism training centres” and “education and

transformation training centres.” However, testimonies

said they were forced to yell patriotic slogans, sing revolutionary songs, and study Chinese

President Xi Jinping’s teachings. Some even described them as prisons with physical and

mental abuse, and compulsory lessons on Communist propaganda.

China’s director at Human Rights Watch, Sophie Richardson, claimed the government

“has provided no credible reasons for holding these people and should free them immediately”.

She believes imprisonment is “not because they have committed any crimes, but because they

deem them politically unreliable” (Human Rights Watch, 2017).

Figure I. United Nations Human Rights Council (Source: Tamirat,

2014).

Figure II. Uyghur reeducation camps in Xinjiang (Source: Zhang, 2018).

HISTORY OF THE PROBLEM

Nationalities policy

Since the seventeenth century, China has struggled in accommodating Islam within its

rule given the threat it posed to Chinese syncretism. With the Chinese acquisition of Muslim

territories including Xinjiang and Gansu during the Qing dynasty, these frustrations further

intensified.

Beginning in 1949, the ethnic Chinese Communist Party

implemented the Stalinist policy of creating nationalities (Johnson,

2018). The policy was meant to unify all ethnic groups, build

relationships of interdependence, and collaborate in “the creation

and development of the Chinese civilization’’ (‘’Information Office

of,’’ 1999). However, the policy was not precisely tolerant.

Minorities were forced to “limit” their beliefs and traditions to get

in line with the Communist brotherhood. In case of a conflict, the

state used military force and torture to remind them their

appropriate bounds (Leung, 2010).

During the reform era between 1970 and 2010, development

was meant to eradicate all differences, by prioritizing economy over

culture. Today, the state has taken an open policy of Han ethnocentrism. It has also taken

measurements to reduce Islam’s (and Christianity’s) visibility by tearing down temples, while

promoting “indigenous” religions including Buddhism and Taoism.

The state continues to justify the actions taken against Muslim Uyghurs “with the war

on terrorism”, when most of them “are aimed to Islam itself.” For instance, fasting during

Ramadan was banned in universities, public transportation was systematically denied to

women with veils and men with beards, and the reintroduction of re-education camps with the

objective of encouraging secular life (Johnson, 2018).

Xinjiang

Uyghurs and Hans

Having a Muslim majority was a concern for the Chinese government since the

autonomy of the region remained under Uyghur control. For this reason, in 1949 the

government encouraged Hans (the largest ethnic group in China) to populate Xinjiang to

Figure III. “All nationalities of our nation have already

united into a great family” (Source: Wei, 1955)

reduce the demographic and strengthen their position. From

this successful tactic, Xinjiang went from a populous 95%

Muslim majority to a balanced 55% (Ishfaq, 2018).

China’s official narrative regarding Xinjiang is that

Uyghurs have no claim to the area because they migrated

from other Central Asian territories. This has created

tension between Hans and Uyghurs, and inspired protests

and attacks for the autonomy of the region (Ishfaq, 2018).

China used this to further intervene in the region and increase security.

Strike Hard Campaign against Violent Terrorism

Protests quickly escalated into violence, and Hans accused the government of failing to

protect them. In response, China launched a security

campaign in the region to maintain “stability and eliminate

security dangers” (Branigan, 2010). Several campaigns

followed over the years, with many Uyghurs being arrested

and others given the death penalty. In 2014, the government

launched another campaign “against violent terrorism”,

partially inspired by the attack on the Twin Towers. The

campaign targeted electronics and religious materials from

the Uyghurs and was conducted “without discipline”. Surveillance and the use of force were

increased. Many were killed under the threat of a “premeditated attack by terrorists and

religious extremists” (Mudie, 2014).

China’s response

Chinese officials said the security measures and religious limitations on Uyghurs were

aimed at “trying to prevent violent, anti-state episodes” which they attributed to “separatism,

terrorism, and religious extremism” (Cumming-Bruce, 2018). China repeatedly denied the

existence of re-education camps, and the accusations on human rights violations. A counselor

at the Chinese mission to the UN, Yao Shaojun, claimed that Uyghurs and other ethnic

minorities enjoyed “the best protection of their human rights in history” (Lynch, 2018).

CURRENT SITUATION

Figure IV. Population in Xinjiang by ethnicity (Source: Orenstein, 2013)

Figure V. Ethnic Uighur women grab a riot policeman as they protest in

Urumqi in July (Source: The Guardian, 2010)

Hints on infrastructure

In 2018, satellite photographs on Google Maps showed massive, highly secure

compounds outside the small town of Dabancheng. Academics and other international human

rights organizations continued monitoring them closely, despite Beijing’s abrupt efforts to

suppress all available online information about the camps. Further investigations later revealed

that these security camps had existed for about a decade. Over the years, their number

throughout Xinjiang had decreased, while their size had inversely increased. As of July 2018,

at least one million Uyghurs were calculated to be held in these ‘’political indoctrination’’

camps (Griffiths, Westcott, 2018).

Both the Chinese Communist Party and its ambassadors at the United Nations

immediately rejected the allegations and the existence of

camps whatsoever. But, according to a report by the

Jamestown Foundation in 2018, spending on security-

related construction in Xinjiang rose by nearly 20 billion

yuan (US $2.9 billion), or 213%, between 2016 and 2017.

Other local budget documents analyzed by the report,

proved the expenditure on domestic security surged by

92% in the one year period, with a 239% increase in

spending for ‘’detention center management’’ and 118% increase in spending for the ‘’justice

system’’ (Westcott, 2018).

Ethnic persecution

‘’De-extremification’’ efforts

Towards the end of 2018, the Chinese government finally admitted the existence of

what it called ‘’re-education centres’’ in Xinjiang. Some Chinese officials described the sites

as vocational training centres aimed at ‘’de-extremification’’ to restore public, nationwide

stability. Numerous human rights organizations, including the Uyghur Human Rights Project

(UHRP), have called out the violations, demanding explanations. The UHRP claimed that the

cultural cleansing of Uyghurs, the predominant group among those targeted by the Chinese

government, was an ‘’attempt to find a solution to the Xinjiang problem,’’ which may require

Figure VI. Satellite image of a Dabancheng internment camp, April

2018 (Source: Sudworth, 2018).

‘’mass murder’’, thus accumulating a series of instances that resemble the ‘’precursors of

cultural and possibly physical genocide’’ (Lyons, 2018).

State-of-the-art surveillance regime

The Chinese government is widely known for developing a state-of-the-art surveillance

regime. According to Human Rights Watch, these advancements, are currently used to sustain

the state’s political purposes. By investigating Uyghurs and other Muslims who might be

deemed ‘’untrustworthy’’, these systems aid the internment camps’ purposes. These systems

include deploying flocks of drones disguised as birds to surveil citizens, using surveillance

cameras with facial recognition technology, Wi-Fi sniffers, and police checkpoints to monitor

the country’s Uyghur population (Samuel, 2018).

Out of all, the most alarming method is the Integrated

Joint Operations Platform (IJOP). According to HRW, the

app is used to flag individuals deemed suspicious, whether

or not they have committed any crime, based on criteria

provided by the system. It identifies the individual, and

automatically displays his or her personal data, including

their blood type, height, religious practices, political

affiliations, and at least two-dozen more categories that

broadly define the individuals (Human Rights Watch, n.d.).

This encouraged the targeting, and imprisonment of

minorities, and specific groups.

International media

In Xinjiang, and China as a whole, the activities of local and foreign journalists are

closely monitored by the state. There are only a few independent sources of news from the

region, and for Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities residing there, jamming of radio

frequencies and internet censorship limit access to the reports. Since a 10-month blockade on

the internet in 2009, the province has been subjected to more intense censorship and

surveillance than other parts of China (Griffiths, Westcott, 2018).

The Chinese state broadcaster CCTV has been fundamental in the knowledge the

international audience has of the Chinese internment camps. It has aired footage inside what

they describe as ‘’vocational training camps’’, showing smiling Uyghurs learning Chinese and

Figure VII. Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP). (Source: Ma, 2019)

other manual skills. It is because of the Chinese government, they say, that they were

‘’discovered’’ and ‘’saved’’ (Westcott, Xiong, 2018).

However, the international media has said

Uyghurs are ‘’ill-treated’’ there, tortured, and

‘’brainwashed.’’ Uyghurs are ‘’forced to yell patriotic

slogans, sing revolutionary songs, and study Chinese

President Xi Jinping’s teachings’’. Pictures have also

shown that Uyghur Muslims have been forced to

welcome Communist Party officials to their homes to

‘’maintain social stability and achieve lasting security’’ (Westcott, Xiong, 2018). It is the

ultimate demonstration of political indoctrination, charismatic authoritarianism, and

ethnocentrism in the modern era.

International response

In the United States, Vice President

Mike Pence has emphasized arguable political

flaws by the Chinese state, and a deliberate

attempt to repress its Uyghur population. He

said Chinese citizens are ‘’theoretically’’ free to

practice any religion but have been subjected to

mass surveillance to bring religious worship

under stricter state control. He also declared

that, by 2020, China’s government ‘’aim[s] to

implement an Orwellian system premised on controlling virtually every facet of human life’’,

but promised that, as much as China wants to eliminate the United States from the international

political stage and ‘’prevent [them] from coming to the aid of [their] allies,’’ they will ‘’fail’’

(The White House, 2018).

The United Kingdom has claimed that their own diplomats have visited Xinjiang and

have ‘’concur[red] that those reports [of internment camps] are broadly accurate’’. The

European Parliament and the European Union’s External Action Service have repeatedly

demanded the release of jailed and disappeared human rights lawyers, dissenters, and activists,

and have expressed concerns about the situation in Xinjiang (Westcott, 2018).

In contrast, more than a dozen members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation

(OIC) signed a statement supporting China’s policies against its Muslim-minority Uyghur

Figure VIII. Uyghur journalist Gulchehra Hoja holds a picture of her brother who has been

missing in Xinjiang for more than a year. (Source: Watson, Westcott, 2018).

Figure IX. A Chinese flag flies above a closed mosque in the Xinjiang city of Kashgar. The wall poster reads

‘’Stability is a blessing, instability is a calamity.’’ (Source: Sudworth, 2018).

populations. The delegations, which include Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab

Emirates, have been widely criticized for their dichotomous stance as, on one hand, they have

been vocal in condemning abuses against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, while on the other,

they have praised Beijing’s efforts to suppress their equally Muslim community.

UN ACTIONS

UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination reviewed China’s periodic

report “on measures taken to implement the provisions of the International Convention on the

Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination” in August of 2018 (OHCHR, 2018).

China’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Yu Kianhua, highlighted that

the changes to the Constitution in 2018 reflected “more fully the ethnic policy focused on ethnic

equality and solidarity.” The Principal Assistant Secretary added that a committee had been

setup “to coordinate and review the support for ethnic minorities” with a $500 million budget.

The Director of the Legal Affairs Bureau ended by assuring China “embraced the values of

tolerance and respect for cultural diversity” claiming that “every ethnic group shared the same

dignity and was entitled to its own cultural life, to practice its own religion and to use its own

language (OHCHR, 2018)”.

Committee Experts congratulated China for creating extraordinary prosperity, but

remained concerned over the growing inequality, particularly for the ethnic minorities. They

reminded China’s lack for “an anti-racial discrimination law and a national human rights

institution in line with the Paris Principle.” The biggest concern was on discrimination in

context of laws fighting terrorism, separatism and extremism. An expert said China had turned

Uyghurs communities into “something that resembled a massive internment camp shrouded in

secrecy, a ‘no rights zone’’’ (OHCHR, 2018).

U.N. Officials

UNHCR chief Michelle Bachelet asked China permission to access the region of

Xinjiang to verify allegations. She said the UNHCR intends “to carry out an independent

assessment of the continuing reports pointing to wide patterns of enforced disappearances and

arbitrary detentions (Nebehay, 2019).” China previously said it would welcome officials as

long as they did not intervene in “domestic matters.” Despite this, China said there is yet “to

define a time which is convenient to both sides” (Withnal, 2019).

However, the Under-Secretary for the United Nations Counter-Terrorism Office,

Vladimir Ivanovich Voronkov, was allowed to visit Xinjiang in June of 2019. His spokesman

assured the office “worked to ensure that measures used to fight terror respected human rights.”

However, the UN Director for Human Rights Watch said the visit “risks confirming China’s

false narrative that this is a counterterrorism issue, not a question of massive human rights

abuses’’ (Withnal, 2019).

POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS

1. Cease immediately the “Strike Hard Campaign against Violent Terrorism” in Xinjiang,

including the “fanghuiju” teams, “Becoming Family” and other compulsory programs

aimed at surveilling and controlling Turkic Muslims (Human Rights Watch, 2018).

a. Terminate the operation of the Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), as

well as Fengcai, both functioning as apps aimed at violating the privacy of

individuals both as Chinese residents and visitors and targeting purported

suspicious subjects based on criteria established by the Chinese government

(Human Rights Watch, 2018).

b. Call for the Chinese state to disclose the current location and status of Uyghur

students, refugees and asylum seekers who returned to China over the past five

years under government demands (Committee on the Elimination of Racial

Discrimination, 2018).

c. Eliminate travel restrictions that disproportionately affect members of ethnic

minorities and return passports to Xinjiang residents (Committee on the

Elimination of Racial Discrimination, 2018).

d. Cease the pressure on host governments to forcibly return Turkic Muslim

nationals abroad unless pursuant to an extradition request for legitimate law

enforcement purposes (Human Rights Watch, 2018).

2. Urge the Chinese Communist Party to establish independent national human rights

institutions that adapt to the principles stipulated in the Paris Principles, adopted by the

General Assembly in 1993 (Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination,

2018). These institutions should be granted sufficient structural independence and

financial and human resources to fulfill the Principles’ goals of promoting human rights

‘’through education, outreach, the media, publications, training and capacity building’’

as well as by providing the Government with advice and assistance (‘’Paris Principles,’’

n.d.).

3. Encourage members of the Human Rights Council, and the General Assembly as a

multilateral body, to adopt similar measures to those established in the United States’

‘’Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2018’’, aimed at ‘’calling for an end to the

arbitrary detention, torture, and harassment of [Uyghur] communities inside and outside

of China’’ (U.S. Senate, 2018).

4. Review China’s ‘’National Human Rights Action Plans’’ for the 2016-2020 period,

which establish specific clauses that demand the government’s compliance with both

domestic and international human rights policies that have yet been unfulfilled and

defied by recent violations, including the detention of Muslim minorities in ‘’re-

education centres’’ (Office of the State Council, 2016).

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