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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 16-Nov-2018
16-Nov-18 World View -- Fifteen countries challenge China's human rights in Xinjiang province

Web Log - November, 2018

16-Nov-18 World View -- Fifteen countries challenge China's human rights in Xinjiang province

China's crackdown on religions continues

by John J. Xenakis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

Fifteen countries challenge China's human rights in Xinjiang province
China's crackdown on religions continues

Fifteen countries challenge China's human rights in Xinjiang province

Car with BBC reporters stopped by Chinese police in Xinjiang in October (BBC)

Car with BBC reporters stopped by Chinese police in Xinjiang in October (BBC)

The ambassadors to China from a group of 15 Western countries are reportedly taking coordinated action to condemn China's human rights record in Xinjiang province, where evidence has been accumulating for several months that about a million Chinese citizens of Uighur ethnicity are forcibly locked up in vast "re-education centers" or "re-education prisons," where they're required to sing Chinese Communist Party (CCP) songs and pledge allegiance to the CCP.

The 15 ambassadors have drafted a letter to be sent to Chen Quanguo, Xinjiang’s CCP boss. The draft letter reads in part:

"We are deeply troubled by reports of the treatment of ethnic minorities, in particular individuals of Uighur ethnicity, in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.
In order to better understand the situation, we request a meeting with you at your earliest convenience to discuss these concerns."

The project is being led by Canada. The other 14 countries are Britain, France, Switzerland, European Union, Germany, Netherlands, Australia, Ireland, Sweden, Belgium, Norway, Estonia, Finland and Denmark.

The response from China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hua Chunying was both angry and bizarre. Here are excerpts:

An ambassador is supposed to promote the mutual understanding, mutual trust and cooperation between the receiving state and the sending state, rather than raise unreasonable requests and interfere in the internal affairs of the receiving state based on hearsay.

Maybe you could interview these ambassadors and ask them whether they have got all the facts straight before writing this letter. Do they know that we have another 54 ethnic minority groups besides the Han and the Uyghur? Do they know that China has more than 40 laws and regulations including the Constitution which have clear stipulations on ethnic minority groups' usage and development of their languages and cultures? Maybe you could ask these ambassadors whether the ethnic minority groups in their countries like the US and Canada, learn English? Is their learning of English also considered as an attempt by their governments to extinguish or assimilate languages and cultures of the ethnic minority groups? ...

I think what they have done is very rude and unacceptable. We hope that they could fulfill their duties and obligations as ambassadors, work to help their countries learn about China in a truthful, all-around and multidimensional way, and play a positive and constructive role in enhancing mutual trust, friendship and cooperation between their countries and China.

I would like to reiterate that Xinjiang as an open region welcomes those who go there with goodwill. Anyone harboring malicious intentions and prejudice and seeking to interfere in China's internal affairs will be firmly rejected."

So China's re-education prisons are being compared to Americans and Canadians learning to speak English. As far as I know, we don't beat, torture and jail people until they learn English. That's about as bizarre as you can get.

Beyond that, the statement contains no attempt to address the charges of human rights abuses in Xinjiang except to call the ambassadors' actions "very rude and unacceptable."

Finally, the description of Xinjiang as "an open region" may be true in a sense, but several BBC on-site investigations show that every word and action is rigidly controlled by the security forces. BBC reporters may be allowed into Xinjiang but they're closely followed by "minders," and prevented from approaching the re-education prisons.

The letter by 15 ambassadors will not cause China to change its behavior -- nothing ever does -- but it will embarrass the Chinese and make it more difficult for them to continue lying. CNN and Reuters and BBC (26-Oct) and China Foreign Ministry

China's crackdown on religions continues

The Uighurs are Muslims, but as I've described several times in the past, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) considers all non-indigenous religions to be dangerous. These include Islam, Protestantism, Catholicism and Buddhism.

The reason is that pretty much every religion has, at one time or another, been the underpinning of an anti-government rebellion in China.

So the Buddhist White Lotus Society led the Red Turban Rebellion that overthrew the Yuan Dynasty in 1358, and came close to overthrowing the Qing dynasty in the White Lotus Rebellion (1796-1804). Of course the Tibetan Buddhists frightens the CCP, and the Falun Gong movement, which is also Buddhist-based, terrifies the CCP.

The CCP has been particularly heavy-handed this year in cracking down on Christianity. That's partially because of the Taiping Rebellion (1850-64). That rebellion was led by Hong Xiuquan who had been converted to Christianity by a Protestant missionary, and who had a hallucinatory vision that he was the son of God and the younger brother of Jesus. He formed the Society of God Worshippers that spread and drew converts from ethnic Hakkas to form the Taiping Army that, once again, almost overthrew the Qing Dynasty.

China, throughout its history, has rarely been able to govern itself, and was frequently conquered by outside armies. It took only small armies of Mongols to rule China for centuries, and then a small army of Manchus to do the same for centuries. When China wasn't being conquered and ruled by outside armies, it was a country of regions and warlords fighting each other. It's only since Mao's Communist Revolution in 1949 that China was finally self-governing through a central government, but even that was almost destroyed by Mao's Great Leap Forward and Mao's Great Cultural Revolution, which killed tens of millions of people through starvation and execution.

Today, the CCP is the most paranoid government on earth. They're even afraid of Winnie the Pooh because Winnie the Pool looks like president Xi Jinping, and might be used as a symbol to trigger a rebellion. Can you imagine Donald Trump or another Western leader being terrified of Winnie the Pooh? Yet, Xi Jinping is terrified of Winnie the Pooh. That's how pathetic he is as a leader. He's made himself into a total dictator, and the only way he can rule is by killing, torture, rape, abductions, massacres, atrocities, or, in the case of the Uighurs, massive re-education prisons holding millions of people.

The CCP has identified what it calls the "five poisons" of society that must be controlled or stamped out. These are Tibetans, Uighur Muslims, democracy activists, Taiwanese, and Falun Gong practitioners.

The equivalent situation in America would be if the government declared blacks and Catholics to be "poisons," along with gun owners and Jews, would need to be sent to re-education prisons to be forced to become Protestants.

In July, a group of 30 workers at Jasic Technology in Shenzen who were treated abusively and weren't being paid decided to unionize. The CCP jailed them for "gathering a crowd to disrupt public order," not even letting them see a lawyer. Last week, Marxist and Maoist students from Peking University and other colleges traveled to Shenzen to form the "Jasic Workers' Solidarity Group" to support the workers.

To the paranoid CCP, this situation is very dangerous, because it could lead to an anti-government rebellion, so naturally these groups of students have been violently rounded up and jailed. This was followed by a crackdown on student activism on campus, banning Marxist study groups, and punishing students at Peking University, Renmin University and Nanjing University. The CCP know very well that the government was brought down in 1949 by Marxist and Maoist forces, and they know that it could happen again.

So whether it's Winnie the Pooh, or the Uighurs, or the Tibetans, or the Falun Gong, the Chinese government are terrified of everything, and consider pretty much everyone to be their enemy.

Like central governments throughout China's history, the CCP is extremely weak and will end as quickly as it began. It can't govern except by developing massive weapons systems and planning for a war that it will lose, but not before it's brought catastrophe to itself and the entire world. Radio Free Asia (12-Nov) and AP and Economist

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(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the 16-Nov-18 World View -- Fifteen countries challenge China's human rights in Xinjiang province thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (16-Nov-2018) Permanent Link
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China's crackdown on religions continues

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