Rights group finds ‘crimes against humanity’ in China’s treatment of Uyghurs
China is guilty of ongoing “crimes against humanity” in its oppressive treatment of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities, Human Rights Watch said in a detailed report released Monday.
Beijing has imprisoned more than one million members of the main ethnic group in its western Xinjiang region and keeps millions more under a tough system of surveillance and controls, said the report by HRW and Stanford Law School’s Human Rights & Conflict Resolution Clinic.
“The Chinese government has committed — and continues to commit — crimes against humanity against the Turkic Muslim population,” the report said.
“The Chinese government’s apparent goal in creating the camps is the erasure of Turkic Muslim culture and religion,” it said, specifying Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other groups in Xinjiang.
The ongoing policies violate the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which says widespread or systematic attacks on a civilian population are a crime, the report said.
It faulted the Chinese government for illegal imprisonment, torture and murder of Uyghurs, and of intentional policies of forced labor and sexual violence toward them.
