China's Police State: The Human Rights Crisis in Xinjiang

Monday, November 5, 2018
A police officer talks to men in a street in Kashgar, Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, China, March 24, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Speaker
Pin Lu

Chairman of the Board, Uyghur Human Rights Project

Presider
Elizabeth C. Economy

C. V. Starr Senior Fellow and Director for Asia Studies

Asia Program

China has turned Xinjiang into a surveillance state. It’s estimated that over a million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities have been put in “re-education camps” where detainees are made to drink alcohol and eat pork, sing Chinese anthems, and denounce their religion. Outside the camps, thousands of video cameras line the streets, and even purchasing a kitchen knife means turning over personal information so that it can be encoded in a QR code. China has defended these practices, saying that they are necessary to combat the rising tide of religious extremism, while former US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley described the situation as “straight out of George Orwell.” Nury Turkel, chairman of the board for the Uyghur Human Rights Project, joins us to discuss the increasingly dire situation in Xinjiang and what the West can do. 

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