Back in August 2018, the UN was informed that nearly one million Uighur Muslims and other Muslims residing in China were being detained in the West Xinjiang area in camps that had been set up to host them for “re-education programs”.
This wasn’t the first the world had heard of the camps, but it was the first time the news had been brought to the fore at an international level. The claims were put forward by human rights groups, but China refused to own up to the allegations.
However, evidence proves otherwise. The Chinese treatment of the Uighurs is cruel, making the lives of the Muslim minority in China extremely difficult.
Understanding the fundamentals
The Uighurs of China are mainly Muslims and have a population of nearly 11 million in western Xinjiang. The minority aligns itself culturally and ethnically to Central Asian nations, and their language is reminiscent of Turkish.
Xinjiang is located in the far west of China, and is by far the biggest region in the country. The area, in theory, is autonomous, having some extent of self-governance.
The Why, The What and The How
Experts and officials estimate that nearly two million Uighurs and other Muslims have been detained since April 2017. The Uighurs have been subjected to a crackdown by the government for nearly ten years, with the suppression of religious expression and freedom.
The detainees in camps have been charged with crimes and can’t contest the detention as they have no access to legal avenues to do so. Media reports state that the charges are arbitrary and random, such as going to a mosque, sharing Quranic materials or traveling to and contacting people from a list of 24 countries China deems ‘sensitive’ like Turkey.
It ultimately boils down to the fact that the crime of these people is simply being Muslim – being a practicing Muslim is considered to be extremism.
It has been estimated by experts that the “re-education” efforts took root in 2014, and gained momentum in 2017. Journalists analyzed satellite imagery and found that 39 of the camps had grown in size three-fold between April 2017 and April 2018. Much like the Indian camps, these were the size of soccer fields, only larger – nearly 140 fields in total.
The campaign against the Uighur Muslims has been explained differently by China and academics. China insists that it is dealing with threats from separatist Islamist groups, and that some of these Muslims have joined the Islamic State Militant group.
However, according to an academic Liwei Wu (pseudonym), the campaign against the Muslims of Uighur is an effort to sinicise the Uighur community. That is, to bring religion under the control of the atheist Communist party and under the influence of Chinese culture.
This campaign has involved the removal of domes, Islamic Mosques, Arabic signs and in some cases, the demolition of Churches. There has been an active resistance against the building of new mosques and many Arabic medium schools have been shut down.
The party had released a five-year plan detailing its efforts. The plan to curtail religious freedoms all over the country includes “re-education camps for as many as a million Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province, demolition threats for a Hui Muslim mosque in Ningxia, and the closing of Protestant ‘mega-house churches’ in Beijing, Chengdu, and Guangzhou.”
Going Deeper
The Chinese narrative is detailed in the following excerpt from the Communist Party recording: “Members of the public who have been chosen for “re-education” have been infected by an ideological illness. They have been infected with religious extremism and violent terrorist ideology, and therefore they must seek treatment from a hospital as an inpatient. …the religious extremist ideology is a type of poisonous medicine, which confuses the mind of the people. … If we do not eradicate religious extremism at its roots, the violent terrorist incidents will grow and spread all over like an incurable malignant tumor.”
While the country used to deny the existence of the camps altogether, it has now begun to defend them. Nur Iman, a Uighur Muslim wrote an article titled ‘I Was A Model Uighur. China Took My Family Anyway’, in which she details how China positions the camps and how her family is still detained.
She stated that China describes the camps as “as ‘re-education’ camps focused on potential terrorists or job training and takes carefully selected groups on Potemkin tours to visit them.”
In line with her claim, in October 2018, officials have dubbed the camps as “vocational education and training programs.” And in 2019, they were officially known as “vocational training centers”. Shohrat Zakir, Xinjiang’s governor described them as boarding schools designed to provide job skills to its students, who had the freedom to come and go as they pleased.
Moreover, the camp has been described as having two goals, according to a government report, ‘to nip the terrorist activities in the bud’, to teach Mandarin, Chinese law, vocational training and to deter the influence of extremism, religious or otherwise. The officials deny the claims that its inhabitants are forcefully detained, subjected to abuse and forced to denounce Islam.
After China acknowledged the existence of the camps last year, the country began letting some detainees out in the face of the backlash. However, the once-detainees do not get the real freedom.
The freedom they get is partial. A writer, Gene Bunin pointed out that “the ex-detainees typically being shunted into other forms of the carceral network that China has built to contain the people of Xinjiang. …for most of the released, the freedom obtained is only partial at best. While a large number have been placed under what appears to be surveilled house arrest, some of the documented releases were let out only to be transferred to factories or other compulsory labor.”
The news that most people had been released from the internment camps has been circulated, but it is deemed falsified at best. Nur Iman too asks the question most people are asking, “If most people have been released, then I would like to ask China this question: Where are my parents?”
A Look at a Camp and What Happens Within
The Luopu County No 1 Vocational Skills Training Centre is a mass of concrete, which is hard to miss. Located in Xinjiang, the building serves as an internment camp for the Uighur Muslims.
The compound is enclosed with tall white walls complete with surveillance cameras, barbed wire. The high walls are patrolled by a number of guards carrying batons, with police cars in tow. The center of the camp is massive, unfolding across several thousand square meters. The building is formidable and imposing.
The Luopu County No 1 Vocational Skills Training Centre has expanded over the years as their country cracks down against the minority. According to the Guardian, the camp houses “12,000 “students” as well as another 2,100 inmates at another detention center – a total of about 7% of the country’s adult population, or 11% of the entire male population.”
Within Lupou, the movement of its inhabitants is stunted by security checkpoints, full body scans, face scans and vehicle searches. Reports from Human Rights Watch and other sources directly contradict China’s claims that the camp operates as a vocational education center meant to train voluntary students.
While information is limited, those who have managed to escape the camps have reported harsh and cruel conditions and living situations. They detail that the inhabitants are forced to pledge loyalty to the CCP and leave the fold of Islam.
The escaped detainees also report instances of torture and sleep deprivation during interrogation sessions. Women have also been subjected to sexual abuse. Several women stated that they were coerced into undergoing abortions and having contraceptive devices implanted in them.
The tools of training are markedly indoctrinated as they are forced to sing praises for Communism and learn Mandarin. Other people also claim that the camps are organized like prisons, with cameras and microphones infiltrating every room, recording and watching each and every move of the inhabitants.
The camps also upset families. Parents are separated from their children, and the children effectively become orphans and are sent to orphanages run by the state. Uighur parents that don’t live in China face a dilemma, having to choose between returning to be with their children and risk being detained or staying away for their own safety.
The Global Criticism
While the world at large has openly criticized Chinese treatment of the Uighur Muslims, little concrete action has been taken.
When the news broke in 2018, the UK government simply voiced concern about the internment camps and the treatment of the Uighurs.
A congressional committee from the US requested Trump’s administration to penalize the companies and officials linked to the crisis. They wrote, “Muslim ethnic minorities are being subjected to arbitrary detention, torture, egregious restrictions on religious practice and culture, and a digitized surveillance system so pervasive that every aspect of daily life is monitored.”
The request bore fruit when the Trump administration complied on 11th October 2019, placing sanctions on 8 major companies based in China.
