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Why China’s Uighur crackdown must be stopped at all costs

This month, the United Nations’ most senior human rights official, Michelle Bachelet, demanded access to the “re-education camps” that have sprung up across China’s Xinjiang province to impose Communist secularism on the country’s Uighur Muslim minority. Around two million Uighurs are thought to have been imprisoned in the camps, with widespread reports of beatings, torture, malnutrition and fatalities.

Yet, tragically, such discrimination is nothing new for China, nor in neighbouring countries. Across the region, certain minorities and unrecognised groups have been forced to endure torture and incarceration for years, creating humanitarian crises largely ignored by the West. Now the situation is getting worse, as more Asian countries turn to oppression as a means to solve their socio-economic challenges. Instead of simply turning a blind eye, it’s time for the international community to start standing up for their victims.

Tragically, for thousands of oppressed Uighurs, it may already be too late. The internment camps, where tasers and stun guns are routinely used to punish the inmates for their faith, are just the apex of a relentless strategy of oppression. In their own communities, Uighur children are separated from their parents and young people forced to marry partners of the predominant Han Chinese ethnicity. To stamp out their culture, China’s henchmen simply destroy mosques and books. As if that weren’t enough, the Uighur are even hounded in their own homes by spies who are dispatched to live with Muslim families and inform on anyone not living a strictly secular life.

It’s all grimly reminiscent of 1930s Germany, but there’s little sign of China relaxing its grip. Beijing has openly referred to the Uighurs as a “cancerous tumour” and President Xi Jinping seems determined to stamp out religion in all its forms, as seen by his raids on Christian churches. Thus far, the response from the global community has been limited to a dozen countries, which have called on Beijing to end the Uighurs’ arbitrary detention. U.S. officials have suggested the Trump administration is considering sanctions, but as yet none have been forthcoming.

Indeed, if the history of neighbouring Tibet is anything to go by, firm global action could be decades away. Activists have opposedChina’s conduct in the region for years, even setting themselves on fire to protest what they see as an illegal occupation, but the U.S. and its allies have done little to support them. This means that, just as in the Uighur heartlands, China’s security agents are free to conduct mass surveillance with impunity, using torture and imprisonment to create what some have described as a “giant prison”, a far cry from the vibrant touristic paradise depicted in Chinese propaganda films.

Despite the global outcry, the repression seems to be getting worse. China even plans to impose its own puppet Dalai Lama on the Tibetan people, to ensure he toes the Communist party line. Again, the international community appears to be standing by, arms firmly folded. The U.S. says it will oppose any Chinese attempt to hijack the next Dalai Lama’s appointment – but refuses to say what action, if any, it will take. The EU’s lack of response, meanwhile, has been deafening.

Wider problem

But while it’s easy to criticise Beijing and its ruthless silencing of dissent, we should remember that even its (at least somewhat) more liberal neighbours are guilty of overlooking human rights. Take the case of the Lai Dai Han, the ostracised community whose mothers were raped by South Korean soldiers during the Vietnam War. The community is thought to number as many as 30,000; its members routinely recount a childhood of bullying and physical attacks by their Vietnamese peers, while their mothers were slut-shamed and thrown in jail.

Approaching 50 years since the end of the Vietnam War, the Lai Dai Han still await justice, ignored by the governments of Vietnam and South Korea. Given Vietnam’s appalling human rights record, its refusal to act is unsurprising. But for South Korea, a country which prides itself on its progressive liberalism, its silence is a (genuine) reason for shame.

Then, of course, there’s Myanmar, where the persecution of the Rohingya minority carries tragic echoes of the Uighurs’ fate. Myanmar’s Muslims have been stateless ever since the country’s first citizenship laws 70 years ago, and the campaign against them has reached a new pitch since a series of terrorist attacks in August 2017. UN investigators have condemned Myanmar’s military for a campaign of murder, rape and arson, saying they are inflicting apartheid and even genocide upon the Muslim minority.

The torment has created a refugee crisis at the camps in neighbouring Bangladesh: well over 1 million Rohingya and other Muslims still live in crowded camps, branded “open-air prisons” by rights groups due to their squalid conditions. Instead of trying to return home, where a life of beatings and intimidation awaits, the refugees are trying to flee by boat to neighbouring countries – and being promptly sent back to their turmoil.

Now even India, which has already deported many of the Rohingya refugees, is pressing ahead with a clampdown on illegal immigration which could leave three million of its own people status. It’s a familiar story for Asian observers: a nationalist government seeking to impose its authority by persecuting an unpopular minority. But given India’s long history of multiculturalism and human rights, it’s a particularly sad example.

The growing tide of populism, combined with religious tensions exacerbated by migration flows, mean other countries could fall into the same trap. To stop this happening, the world needs to put a line in the sand. It’s not enough to simply scold China and its fellow Asian oppressors for their conduct; the wealthy Western states needs to start backing up their words with sanctions, and stop turning their backs on the refugees seeking respite from the tumult.

If firm action isn’t taken, this virulent strain of xenophobic violence will continue to spread.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes.

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