Final Draft 10 Page

Chinese Uyghur Internment, and Three Potential
Solutions
Nathan Bitners
Political Studies
Mrs. Conners & Ms. Lanni
February 5th, 2019
Bitners 1
Internment Camps in China are inhumane and go against our natural rights. The
Internment and torture of Uyghur Muslims goes against 12 of our 30 natural rights. Victims have
told horror stories of inside these camps, and citizens say they have not seen loved ones for
months, and fear they may have died. China has announced their existence as “‘vocational
schools’ which combat ‘terrorism and religious extremism’” which has been proven to be
1
falsified information. The torture and slavery in these camps directly breaks natural rights four
and five. Senator Marco Rubio proposed the idea that U.S. corporations should stop selling
China items that can be used for repression, including DNA technologies and video surveillance
2
tools.
The repression of Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang, China began in 2014, “after the May 23
3
bombing of a marketplace in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, in which 39 people died.” The
Chinese “anti-terrorism” campaign escalated when Communist Party Secretary Chen Quanguo
4
relocated to Xinjiang to take over the operations in 2016. From there, the mass incarceration
grew to extreme proportions, with some rumors circulating about torture and famine inside of the
newly built internment facilities. After being unable to deny the existence of these camps, the
Chinese government announced their existence by saying “people willingly attend special
5
‘vocational schools’ which combat ‘terrorism and religious extremism’.”
1
Sudworth, John. "China's Hidden Camps."
2
Wong, Edward. "U.S. Weighs Sanctions Against Chinese Officials Over Muslim Detention
3
"Chinese Anti-terrorism Campaign Moves Swiftly in First Month." The Christian Science
Monitor. June 24, 2014. Accessed January 23, 2019.
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2014/0624/Chinese-anti-terrorism-camp
aign-moves-swiftly-in-first-month.
4
"China: Massive Crackdown in Muslim Region." Human Rights Watch. September 10, 2018. Accessed January
28, 2019.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/09/09/china-massive-crackdown-muslim-region.
5
Sudworth, John. "China's Hidden Camps." BBC. October 24, 2018. Accessed January 22, 2019.
Bitners 2
The Chinese government has been building internment camps in the Xinjiang province of
China since 2015, and locking away Turkic Muslims in these camps. Reports of torture and
death inside these camps are being published daily. “Nobody can move because they watch you
through the video cameras, and after a while a voice came from the speakers telling you that now
you can relax for a few minutes. That voice also tells you off for moving…we were watched,
6
even in the toilet. In political education camp, we were always under stress.” This imprisonment
does not just stay at these camps, but is also ripping away people's privacy.
The government also deals out home stays, where soldiers routinely come to one’s house,
and often stay overnight to make sure you cannot leave. “Since early 2017, twice a week,
officials came. Some people even stayed for a night. The authorities came in advance and made a
list and assigned new ‘relatives’ to you. … [The officially-assigned “relatives”] talked to my son,
my grandkids, they took pictures, they sat at the table, they asked, ‘Where’s your husband, where
did he go?’ I was really frightened, and I pretended to be busy looking after my grandkids. I was
7
worried that if I spoke I’d let slip that my husband had gone [abroad]. So, I stayed silent.”
The repression of Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang, China began in 2014, “after the May 23
bombing of a marketplace in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, in which 39 people died. 13 people
were executed for ‘organizing, leading and participating in terrorist groups,’ according to the
state run Xinhua news agency. Three more were sentenced to death on the same day by an
Urumqi court for an attack on Tiananmen Square in Beijing in October 2013 in which six people
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/China_hidden_camps.
6
28, 2019.
7
"China: Massive Crackdown in Muslim Region."
Bitners 3
8
died.” The level of repression increased dramatically after Communist Party Secretary Chen
Quanguo relocated from the Tibet Autonomous Region to assume leadership of Xinjiang in late
9
2016. After being unable to deny the existence of these camps, the Chinese government
announced their existence by saying “people willingly attend special ‘vocational schools’ which
combat ‘terrorism and religious extremism’.” These camps have continued to be expanded upon,
10
with one camp doubling in size from March to October 2018.
“In their demand last month, Mr. Rubio and other lawmakers urged officials at the State
and Treasury Departments to impose sanctions on Chinese companies that have profited from
building the camps or the region-wide surveillance system, which includes the collection of
biometric and DNA data. They singled out Hikvision and Dahua Technology for the
surveillance. Mr. Rubio said that the CECC will also ask the United States Commerce
Department to prevent American companies from selling technology to China that could
11
contribute to the surveillance and tracking.”
While this may be a start, there are plenty of companies in China and the surrounding
area that can provide devices for surveillance and tracking. According to europages.co.uk, there
12
are over 100 companies in China alone that provide video surveillance. Sanctions have already
8
aign-moves-swiftly-in-first-month
9
28, 2019.
10
11
Camps." The New York Times. September 10, 2018. Accessed January 22, 2019.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/10/world/asia/us-china-sanctions-muslim-camps.html?module=inline.
12
"EUROPAGES - B2B Search." Biodegradable Packaging | Companies. Accessed January 28, 2019.
https://www.europages.co.uk/companies/China/video surveillance.html.
Bitners 4
been placed on these companies, with the hardest hits going to Hikvision and DahuaTech. “The
United States Senate passed the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act on August 1st, 2018,
under which the United States government will be banned from buying Chinese-made
13
surveillance equipment from several Chinese firms.”
The Chinese government has denied claims that they are imprisoning Uyghur Muslims
and try to suggest that these are anti-terrorism camps. "’The local Chinese government is taking
these preventative counter-terrorism and de-extremization measures to protect more people from
being devoured by terrorism and extremism,’ Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua
14
Chunying said in December, 2018”
This information has been proven false, as many refugees and escapees tell horrible
stories of not being fed and being tortured in these camps. “Nobody can move because they
watch you through the video cameras, and after a while a voice came from the speakers telling
you that now you can relax for a few minutes. That voice also tells you off for moving…we were
15
watched, even in the toilet. In political education camp, we were always under stress.” There
are also many satellite images of these camps being rapidly expanded on, with analysis of these
13
"China's Top Two Surveillance Camera Makers Take Beating from US Ban." South China Morning Post.
September 24, 2018.
Accessed January 28, 2019.
https://www.scmp.com/business/companies/article/2158126/chinas-two-largest-surveillance-camera-maker
s-take-beating-us-ban.
14
Rogin, Josh. "Ethnic Cleansing Makes a Comeback - in China." The Washington Post. August
02, 2018. Accessed January 14, 2019.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/ethnic-cleansing-makes-a-comeback--in-china/
2018/08/02/55f73fa2-9691-11e8-810c-5fa705927d54_story.html?utm_term=.8f2617b21f2c.
15
28, 2019.
Bitners 5
buildings showing them as detention centers. “It appears as a place designed to pack as many
16
people into as small an area as possible” Raphael Sperry
Another solution that has been proposed by The Concerned Scholars features a similar
proposal to Marco Rubio’s suggestion. The Concerned Scholars published a seven-step process
to stop the illegal internment of Uyghur Muslims in China. Their first proposed step is to “call on
states and institutions to issue formal statements demanding that Xi Jinping and Chen Quanguo
immediately abolish the ‘transformation through education’ detention system and release all
Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and other detainees.” The next step would be to “call on states and
institutions to demand and impose economic sanctions on Chinese authorities and technology
companies in- and outside of China, which are benefiting from this process. Such sanctions
should go beyond lower-level officials and target Chen Quanguo, under whose leadership in the
region this system of mass incarceration has been instituted. Likewise, they should include
high-profile technology companies, whose concessions to the Chinese government on internet

17
surveillance have implicated them in the repression presently taking place in the XUAR.”
These two steps would put huge amounts of both political and economic pressure on China, as
well as pressure China major allied countries, including Russia and North Korea.
The third step of this plan would be to “call on states and institutions to introduce
legislation joining Germany and Sweden in granting expedited asylum to Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and
other Turkic Muslim minorities from China and a blanket refusal to deport Uyghurs and other
16
17
"Statement by Concerned Scholars on China’s Mass Detention of Turkic Minorities." Concernedscholars.home
(blog), November 26, 2018. Accessed January 29, 2019. https://concernedscholars.home.blog/.
Bitners 6
18
Turkic Muslims to China.” This could potentially lead to a mass exodus of Muslims from
China, which could lead to economic and political problems in the Chinese government. Step
four of the plan is to “call on Beijing to cease its extra-territorial campaign of harassment against
members of the Uyghur diaspora community around the globe and urge relevant states and
institutions where those communities reside to make the protection of Uyghurs a matter of
19
priority in their diplomatic relations with Beijing.” This step would allow the countries where
Turkic Muslims to reside to join the movement against these camps, as well as stop Turkic
repression in those countries.
The fifth step of this plan is to “call on the thirteen UN member states that expressed
grave concern about the existence of this system of mass incarceration at the recent UN
Universal Periodic Review of China’s human rights record to spearhead a movement for UN
action aimed at investigating this mass internment system and closing the camps. Additionally,
we call on those states that have yet remained silent on this issue, including Muslim-majority
states and those in Central Asia whose own citizens or citizens’ relatives have been interned, to
20
join in this action.” This would pit the UN and many member countries against China, putting
the international community against China until these camps are no more.
The sixth and seventh steps are to “call upon countries presently engaged in negotiations
regarding projects that are part of the Belt and Road Initiative, particularly those that are linking
to the XUAR as a hub for trade and commerce, to make their involvement in these projects
contingent on the closing of the mass internment camps and the ceasing of other means of mass
18
Ibid
19
"Statement by Concerned Scholars on China’s Mass Detention of Turkic Minorities." Concernedscholars.home
(blog), November 26, 2018. Accessed January 29, 2019. https://concernedscholars.home.blog/
20
Ibid
Bitners 7
repression to which the Turkic minorities in this region are currently subjected.” and to “call
upon academic institutions around the world with formal partnerships with state-run Chinese
academic institutions to express their concern about the present situation in the XUAR with their
colleagues and to consider suspending their partnerships until the camps have been closed and all
21
detainees are released.” These steps will stop the countries and organizations from assisting in
the suppression of the Turkic Muslims.
This solution is the best out of the three solutions proposed, as it is very detailed in the
steps of the process to end this illegal internment of Turkic Muslims. One flaw of this plan is that
it takes a large amount of cooperation with other countries, and requires an agreement with many
countries to not deport a major population back to China. However, if this agreement is achieved,
this is the greatest and most detailed plan to stop these camps.
The Solution from the Concerned Scholars is the best solution because of how in depth it
is, and that only some steps can happen and it could result in the problem coming to an end. For
example, if the first step were too happen, it would put immense social pressure on China, and
they could fold under the pressure. The problem with this plan is that this plan would require
many countries to cooperate, including most of the western world.
The repression of Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang, China began in 2014, and has continued
22
for nearly 5 years into 2019. The Internment and torture of Uyghur Muslims goes against 12 of
our 30 natural rights. Victims have told horror stories of inside these camps, and citizens say they
21
Ibid
22
aign-moves-swiftly-in-first-month.
Bitners 8
have not seen loved ones for months, and fear they may have died. China has announced their
existence as “‘vocational schools’ which combat ‘terrorism and religious extremism’” which has
23
been proven falsified information. The torture and slavery in these camps directly breaks
natural rights 4 and 5.
23
Bitners 9
Bibliography
"2018 Annual Report." Regulations on the Registration and Management of Social

Organizations (CECC Full Translation) | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.
October 10, 2018. Accessed January 23, 2019.
https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2018-annual-report.
"Statement by Concerned Scholars on China’s Mass Detention of Turkic Minorities."

Concernedscholars.home (blog), November 26, 2018. Accessed January 29, 2019.
https://concernedscholars.home.blog/
"Universal Declaration of Human Rights." United Nations. Accessed January 30, 2019.
http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/.
Buckley, Chris. "China Breaks Silence on Muslim Detention Camps, Calling Them 'Humane'."
The New York Times. October 16, 2018. Accessed January 23, 2019.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/16/world/asia/china-muslim-camps-xinjiang-uighurs.h
tml.
Buckley, Chris, and Austin Ramzy. "China's Detention Camps for Muslims Turn to Forced
Labor." The New York Times. December 16, 2018. Accessed January 14, 2019.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/16/world/asia/xinjiang-china-forced-labor-camps-uigh
urs.html.
Testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary Scott Busby Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Subcommittee On East Asia, The Pacific, And International Cybersecurity Policy, 1-7 (2018)
(testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary Scott Busby).
Ford, Peter. "Chinese Anti-terrorism Campaign Moves Swiftly in First Month." The Christian
Science Monitor. June 24, 2014. Accessed January 23, 2019.
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2014/0624/Chinese-anti-terrorism-
campaign-moves-swiftly-in-first-month.
Patranobis, Sutirtho. "China Distorting Facts about Xinjiang Camps, Says Exiled
Uyghur Group." Https://www.hindustantimes.com/. October 17, 2018. Accessed January 22,
2019.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/china-distorting-facts-about-xinjiang-camp
s-says-exiled-uyghur-group/story-zzVAKdUMRA2F8KADpWFFRJ.html.
Bitners 10
Rogin, Josh. "Ethnic Cleansing Makes a Comeback - in China." The Washington Post. August
02, 2018. Accessed January 14, 2019.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/ethnic-cleansing-makes-a-co
meback--in-china/2018/08/02/55f73fa2-9691-11e8-810c-5fa705927d54_story.html?utm_
term=.8f2617b21f2c.
Camps." The New York Times. September 10, 2018. Accessed January 22, 2019.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/10/world/asia/us-china-sanctions-muslim-camps.html
?module=inline.

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Chinese Uyghur Internment, and Three Potential

high-profile technology companies, whose concessions to the Chinese government on internet

repression in those countries.

the suppression of the Turkic Muslims.

many countries to cooperate, including most of the western world.

natural rights 4 and 5.

"2018 Annual Report." Regulations on the Registration and Management of Social

"Statement by Concerned Scholars on China’s Mass Detention of Turkic Minorities."

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