UN Report Validates Internment Camp Claims

Bachelet was met by Foreign Minister Wang Yi in May

When UN High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet visited Xinjiang, China in May, critics of Beijing were worried she did not see what they knew -- that Uyghurs were being rounded up and sent into detention camps where they were physically tortured, and "brainwashed" into speaking Mandarin and repeating Communist slogans.

Today, just 10 minutes before her term was up, Bachelet released the long-awaited report, accusing China of serious human rights violations that "may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity".

Bachelet released the report today

However, the 48-page report stopped short of declaring the treatment as "genocide", but it validated the years of work by Uyghur activists, rights groups and academics that China detained Uyghurs, Kazakhs and others for having overseas ties or practicing Islam.

Sophie Richardson, the China director for Human Rights Watch says the report is "an unprecedented challenge to Beijing's lies and horrific treatment of Uyghurs. The high commissioners' damning findings explain why the Chinese government fought tooth and nail to prevent the publication of her Xinjiang report, which lays bare China's sweeping rights abuses."

Indeed. 

Adrian Zenz, who has been researching the camps and abuses through public documents says China will find it hard to refute the report because it uses Chinese documents to prove the rights violations.

The report confirms detentions and forced labour 

"The report is very conservative in its use of data and the conclusions drawn from it, which, together with using Beijing's own sources, will make it very hard for China to counter or refute it," he says in a Twitter thread.

However Zenz points out some weak areas in the report that are light on forced labour and birth prevention, but still comments the cautious and methodical approach makes the report hard to refute. The strongest sections he says are those on internment and religious freedom.

He also notes Bachelet's visit didn't seem to have impacted the report in any way, and delaying its release was "a waste".

Nevertheless, she says, "I said that I would publish it before my mandate ended and I have."

Bachelet said that the delay in publishing had been because she "wanted to take the greatest care to deal with the responses and inputs received from the (Chinese) government last week."

Zenz says the report will be hard to refute

China had already imposed a lot of pressure on her not to release the report, which Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for the foreign ministry said was "a farce orchestrated by the United States and a small number of Western powers."

Beijing submitted a 131-page response to the human rights office's "so-called 'assessment'" it claimed was "based on disinformation and lies", and ignored its success in stopping extremism in Xinjiang.

In any event, for Uyghur activists and rights groups, the report is significant in that it vindicates their work in documenting and reporting on their family members and loved ones being sent away in the camps, some mentally and physically changed after they were released.

"It paves the way for meaningful and tangible action by member states, UN bodies and the business community," said Dolkun Isa, president of the World Uyghur Congress. "Accountability starts now," he added.

Indeed.

The report recommends releasing detainees

Richardson of Human Rights Watch says now the United Nations Human Rights Council should begin investigating the Chinese government's "crimes against humanity targeting the Uyghurs and others -- and hold those responsible to account."

But time is of the essence -- the Human Rights Council starts its last session of the year in 12 days.