What's the truth about the Uighur situation in China? Leave all the lib shit at the door, I want the actual confirmed facts about what's happening.

Approximately 50% of what you hear is outright propaganda, as we know the CIA’s affiliates churn out. We also see CIA assets pushing narratives on Reddit. The next 25% is poorly researched speculation by an evangelical end-timer, and the final 25% is an accurate description of the PRC’s response to far right, religious terrorism and separatism.

First, let’s just establish using safe, American sources that a bunch of Uyghur people went to fight with ISIS in Syria, then returned. Let’s also establish that there have been consistent terrorist attacks with significant casualties and that the CIA and CIA front-groups have funded and stoked Islamic extremism across the world for geopolitical gain.

Now, we need to consider potential responses.

The CPC could give up and surrender Xinjiang to ISIS. This option condemns millions of people to living under a fundamentalist Islamic State, including many non-Muslims and non-extreme Muslims. This option creates a CIA-aligned state on the border, and jeopardises a key part of the Belt and Road initiative, which is designed to connect landlocked countries for development and geopolitical positioning. This option also threatens the CPC’s legitimacy, as keeping China together is a historical signifier of the Mandate of Heaven.

The next option is the American option. Drone strike, black-site, or otherwise liquidate anyone who could be associated with Islamic extremism. Be liberal in doing so. Make children fear blue skies because of drones. When the orphaned young children grow up, do it all again. You can also throw a literal man-made famine in there if you want.

The final option is the Chinese option. Mass surveillance. Use AI to liberally target anyone who may be at risk of radicalisation for re-education. Teach them the lingua franca of China, Mandarin. Pump money into the region for development. When people finish their time in re-education, set them up with state jobs. Keep the surveillance up. Allow and even celebrate local religious customs, but make sure the leaders are on-side with the party.

Let’s take a moment to distinguish that last approach from that of Nazi Germany. Nazi Germany wanted to exterminate the undesirables. Initially it was internment in concentration camps with the outcome up in the air, with a vague hope of shipping them to Madagascar or palestine, but it later morphed into full extermination. All throughout, Nazi Germany was pushing strong rhetoric of antisemitism and stoking ethnic hatred in the public sphere.

There’s no evidence, including from leaked papers, that the goal of the deradicalisation programme is permanent internment or annihilation of Islam. In fact, the leaked papers have Xi explicitly saying Islam should not be annihilated from China:

Mr. Xi also told officials to not discriminate against Uighurs and to respect their right to worship. He warned against overreacting to natural friction between Uighurs and Han Chinese, the nation’s dominant ethnic group, and rejected proposals to try to eliminate Islam entirely in China.

“In light of separatist and terrorist forces under the banner of Islam, some people have argued that Islam should be restricted or even eradicated,” he said during the Beijing conference. He called that view “biased, even wrong.”

As for permanent internment, we know from leaks that the minimum duration of detention is one year — though accounts from ex-detainees suggest that some are released sooner.

Unlike Nazi Germany, there’s no stoking of inter-ethnic hatred or elimination of a specific culture; the CPC actively censors footage from terrorist attacks in China to avoid such an outcome. Xi doesn’t go on TV calling any ethnicity rapists or murderers. Uighur culture is actively celebrated in the media and via tourism. Xinjiang has 24,400 mosques, one per 530 Muslims. That’s three mosques per capita more than their western peers.

Could China’s approach be done better? Almost certainly. Is it the most humane response to extremism we’ve seen so far? That’s for you to decide.

(Reposted from here )

Disclaimer: I did not compile this list of sources/arguments. This was compiled by low_poly_space_shiba, who has since left this server.

the BBC made a documentary on the “concentration camps” that makes them seem like neat schools

https://medium.com/@sunfeiyang/e284934a7aab

UN guy visited

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-rights-un/china-says-reached-broad-consensus-with-u-n-after-xinjiang-visit-idUSKCN1TH00T

pakistan guy visited

https://www.thenews.com.pk/latest/422970-pakistani-diplomat-narrates-visit-to-chinas-xinjiang

world bank investigated

https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/statement/2019/11/11/world-bank-statement-on-review-of-project-in-xinjiang-china

China invited EU and they said no

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-xinjiang-exclusive-idUSKCN1R10QQ

just like they said no to check in Venezuela

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-un-idUSKCN1GO2J0

American and British imperial pigs explain every aspect of the modern anti-China approach, both goals and methods:

Churchill, 1902: What? (https://winstonchurchill.org/publications/finest-hour/finest-hour-159/wsc-a-midnight-interview-1902/)

Kennan, 1948: Why? (https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1948v01p2/d4)

Brzezinski, 1998: How? (https://dgibbs.faculty.arizona.edu/brzezinski_interview)

https://imgur.com/gallery/iclU9H4<-relevant quotes

in tweet form

https://twitter.com/RodericDay/status/1285603816172380160

One of the main voices claiming atrocities are happening in Xinjiang is Rushan Abbas.

https://medium.com/@RobertArlan/a-reddit-ama-claiming-to-be-a-uiyghur-quickly-exposes-a-cia-asset-slandering-china-1d667c098b77

She did a Reddit AMA and people found out she’s a complete State Department asset. She literally worked at Guantanamo Bay as a translator

https://imgur.com/gallery/Xo7cYyq<-relevant stuff

Then there’s the other guy, Adrian Zenz:

Adrian Zenz is the expert on Xinjiang Genocide.

He

works for Victims of Communism, the organization that added worldwide COVID tallies

he is a Rapturist, he thinks he was sent from God to fight the anti-christ embodied in China

he has already been caught lying

https://mobile.twitter.com/rgoodlaw/status/1259300068227760128

basically keep an eye out for the name “Adrian Zenz” he’s behind almost EVERY SINGLE uighur genocide story in the NYT/WaPo/Guardian

there’s also a massive “grassroots” campaign on social media

https://twitter.com/j_bigboote/status/1182726991675625472?s=08

this guy basically went and collected samples you can peruse them yourself

another thing worth looking at is just “atrocity propaganda”, that is, how the USA just says horrendous things about their enemies, smearing them with impunity and destroying their public standing before moving into sanctions, then invasion

the classic case is Nayirah Testimony

https://imgur.com/gallery/jYTvY1T<-relevant stuff

(wiki Nayirah Testimony)

other examples

https://imgur.com/gallery/BHb8LOV<-relevant stuff

here’s an interview with a CIA agent talking about how the whole goal is to bribe and cajole journalists into creating an image that communists eat babies

I don’t know how to post video, but if you tell me how I can

“We didn’t know of one single atrocity committed by the Cubans. It was pure raw false propaganda to create an illusion of communists eating babies for breakfast.”

For a more in depth view, check out this doc (also not compiled by me)

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1d0lynghlCnR6Hs57pypEEhlhHczFVgaYX-TIZD61s_w/edit#

I found this later on.

Not about China specifically, but this article from the Guardian(sorry for the lib source) talks about DPRK defectors lying about DPRK

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/13/why-do-north-korean-defector-testimonies-so-often-fall-apart

“Cash payments in return for interviews with North Korean refugees have been standard practice in the field for years…This practice also drives the demand for “saleable stories”: the more exclusive, shocking or emotional, the higher the fee.”

“But many refugees say they feel pressured for defector stories. Ahn Myung-chol, a former prison guard at Camp 22, said people liked shocking stories and these so-called “defector- activists” were merely responding to this desire. Chong Kwang-il, a former prisoner at Camp 15, said the fame brought by media exposure trapped them, forcing them to reproduce a certain narrative.”

I’m not saying we should dismiss people’s stories out of hand, but there is a large issue with people creating more shocking stories. due to both the profit incentive, and also for propaganda value

tldr; There's lots of terrorism in the region, much of which is likely supported by the US, in an effort to weaken China/manufacture consent against them. Rather than sending in troops, like the USSR did in Afghanistan, or the US did in the entire middle east, China is trying to de-radicalise them. The worst I can honestly say about them is that there's probably some corruption and institutional racism in them, as in all prisons, and they remind me a bit much of residential schools in Canada for my liking. Still definitely a more humane choice than bombing the place to the ground though.

Any thread on the Uighurs isn't complete until you talk about how anti-Communist evangelical German goober Adrian Zenz and how 95% of what you see about the situation comes from his dumbass.

You all can say what you will about the Uighur situation, but this image is pretty damning: https://m.imgur.com/gallery/jArJz56

There were some education centres for re-educating a few thousand people deemed to be at high risk of subscribing to islamic extremist tendencies.

There are currently none left, the last closed in December more than half a year ago. All noise on the topic since is regurgitation of old content.

This thread extensively debunks every Uighur allegation out there.

That's it. Those are the facts.

hey try not to nuke the Lemmy any time soon because bookmarking this one page is way easier than bookmarking all the shit you guys linked

This is a good read with many different sources

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1287411708374454273.html

actual confirmed facts

sniff

I reccomend dw news as a news source, it's German tax payer funded, and they only report on direct testimony from camp detainees and documents leaked to them. They've shown strong evidence of mass arbitrary detention. There's also Darren bylar, an anthropologist who focuses on the surveilence states effects on uyghur Islam.

To supplement what others have already said, we must be vigilant to recognize that empire is deeply invested in creating a new cold war against China. The USA is funding any angle they can to attack China as well as stoking any stories that stick regarding China.

Everything written here about how 90% of American "facts" concerning Uighurs in Xinjiang are derived from the inductive reasoning of a Christian evangelical in non-peer reviewed articles is completely true.

That said, I don't see anything written here about the long history of the region which is now Xinjiang as a state or territory. The fact that nothing anyone has posted here discusses that long history demonstrates an inadequecy of analysis of historical conditions. It leads people to say things like, "Uh, a CIA did it" and move on as if everything is now resolved.

I recently listened to an episode of the Historic.ly podcast with Carl Zha, who I think is quite well informed on Chinese history but interprets that history in ways very different than me. In about five minutes he said 1) Xinjiang has always been part of China -- 5000 years of Chinese history! 2) Xinjiang became part of China in the Qing dynasty -- ~350 years of Chinese history! 3) Xinjiang has had ethnic separatist movements and has declared itself an independent state separate from Chinese rule numerous times in those last 350 years (as recently as the mid-20th century with Soviet backing). To summarize, Xinjiang has always been part of China, so long as "China" only begins with the Qing, and except for all of those times when it wasn't.

To not see any contradiction in these statements is to not be able to see the region and ethnic conflicts as a whole in mainland China through any other lens but Chinese state orthodoxy. To not question why Xinjiang today is part of China while also not questioning why Mongolia today isn't part of China is to just be caught in the currents of US and Chinese state propaganda with no critical awareness or historical analysis.

As well as the stuff in this thread, there is a podcast episode on it from Popular Front

https://soundcloud.com/popularfrontcast/81-chinas-attack-on-the-uighurs-of-xinjiang

There is no "truth" about the situation. It's just another catalyst for a proxy conflict between the US and China. Nothing either side reports should be given any levity over the other.

My take? "Terrorism" is a red herring. It's just capital needing new markets and lower wages. China is just speed running primitive accumulation.

The truth is that there’s countless eyewitness accounts of the heinous shit China is doing and anyone arguing otherwise is either a bad actor or a tool. Tankies needs to get over worshipping the CCP and come to terms with the fact that there’s a reason the largest corporations in America are all on China’s side. Literally just fucking think about the implications of this plainly obvious fact for 2 god damn seconds. China does not give a shit about turning their own people into organ farms and slave labor, they don’t give a shit about you either and they damn well don’t give a shit about using their hedgemon for good. Shits faker than professional wrestling.