What to Know:
- Since 2014, the CCP has placed over one million Muslims of the Uyghur minority group in forced detention camps. This is a human rights abuse at a scale not observed since Hitler’s concentration camps during the Holocaust.
- In January 2021, the Trump Administration formally recognized that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is committing genocide against the Uyghur People.
- The Uyghur [pronounced WE-gur] people are Turkic Muslims in the Xinjiang [pronounced SEEN-gee-aang] region of China who vary ethnically from the Han culture that dominates the majority of China. The CCP has violently pursued Uyghurs’ assimilation and dissolution into the rest of Han culture. They use sadistic techniques including sterilizations, forced abortions, and torture to destroy all Uyghur cultural influences.
- Despite the ongoing genocide, many American businesses seek to deepen ties with China– even in Xinjiang, where the genocide is taking place.
The CCP’s Tactics:
- The CCP exports communist party workers to Xinjiang that move in and live with Uyghur families. Excruciating reports have come out detailing the rapes of Uyghur women, beatings of men, and communist brainwashing of young children.
- The CCP often summons Uyghur citizens to ‘routine’ meetings, only to never be seen again.
- Many cases involve Uyghurs practicing basic aspects of their faith. One leaked case file indicates that the CCP sent a man to 10 years in prison for asking his co-workers to abstain from foul language and consume halal food.
- The CCP also brutally imprisons foreign citizens in internment camps—many Uyghurs visiting in China find themselves spending months under inhumane conditions for no reason.
What to Say/Do - Remind Americans of These Facts:
- Since 1949, the CCP have been responsible for the deaths of nearly 80 million people—more than Stalin and Hitler combined. Communism destroys everything good that it touches.
- The CCP has returned to its savage roots and weaponized a twenty-first century security state by committing an active genocide of over one million Uyghurs. We must never reward such an evil regime, but instead must seek to contain China at every turn.
- Some of America’s largest corporations actively aid the CCP’s brutal persecution of the Uyghur people. Politicians and Americans should call them out:
- Dell, GE, Amazon, and Microsoft have all provided technology to the CCP’s highly advanced public surveillance system, which the CCP uses to spy, track, and imprison Uyghurs.
- Despite international outrage over the Uyghur genocide and continued used of forced labor, Volkswagen and Tesla both opened new factories and dealerships in Xinjiang. Volkswagen said that opening Xinjiang plant was, “based purely on economics.”
- The worst offenders praise the Chinese Communist Party and succumb to its wishes. American companies have fired employees for speaking up on human rights, apologize for ‘accidentally’ acknowledging Taiwan, and even alter whole scripts of media productions. Politicians should make clear that they fight for Americans who speak the truth.
- The United States must come down on companies that aid the CCP’s genocide against the Uyghurs. Congress should pass legislation which enacts stiff penalties for individuals and companies who enable the CCP’s genocide. Politicians should support accountability here.
- Congress must also strengthen legislation that bans the imports of goods produced through forced labor from the Xinjiang region. It should be simple: no slave-made goods should be sold in the United States.