Uyghur officials in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) are regularly visited by Han Chinese “relatives,” who force them to forgo the dietary restrictions of their Muslim faith during weeklong stays, including prohibitions on the consumption of pork and alcohol, according to sources
Some 200 people died and 1,700 were injured in the three-day rampage of violence that began on July 5, 2009 in Urumqi between ethnic minority Uyghurs and Han Chinese, according to China’s official figures, although Uyghur rights groups say the numbers are much higher
In January, China’s foreign ministry welcomed U.N. officials to visit the region, provided they “abide by Chinese law and comply with relevant procedures,” and “avoid interfering in domestic matters or undermining [China’s] sovereignty”
Though Beijing initially denied the existence of re-education camps, China has tried to change the discussion, describing the facilities as “boarding schools” that provide vocational training for Uyghurs, discourage radicalization and help protect the country from terrorism
The New York-based watchdog group worked for 14 months with German security firm Cure53 to reverse engineer the mobile app that officials use to connect to the Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), a Xinjiang policing program that flags people deemed potentially threatening
Adrian Zenz, a lecturer in social research methods at the Germany-based European School of Culture and Theology, has said that some 1.1 million people are or have been detained in the camps—equating to 10 to 11 percent of the adult Muslim population of the XUAR
Though Beijing initially denied the existence of re-education camps, Shohrat Zakir, chairman of the XUAR, told China’s official Xinhua news agency in October 2018 that the facilities are an effective tool to protect the country from terrorism and provide vocational training for Uyghurs