UN EXPERT STATEMENT CONFIRMS FORCED ASSIMILATION AND SEPARATION OF UYGHUR CHILDREN. AS AN ACT OF GENOCIDE, THE UN SHOULD NAME THESE CRIMES AS SUCH.
Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project (URAP) reaffirms the statement issued on September 26, 2023, by UN experts (Mr. Fernand de Varennes, Special Rapporteur on minority issues; Ms. Alexandra Xanthaki, Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, and Ms. Farida Shaheed, Special Rapporteur on education) expressing concern regarding East Turkestan’s forced separation and language policies in facilitating forced assimilation. The intent of the Chinese Government to forcibly assimilate what was left of the Uyghur ethnic and linguistic identity is abundantly clear. The statement refers to the expansion of East Turkestan’s State-run boarding school system, which almost exclusively teaches in Mandarin and promotes Han cultural practices, and the forcible separation of Uyghur children from their parents, as evidence of forced assimilation and violations of basic human rights. The statement affirms that the Chinese Government has been successful in institutionalizing a system whereby Uyghur and Tibetan children are transformed into obedient, assimilated servants of the Communist Party of China.
The expert statement provides a basis for the finding of genocide against the Uyghurs in breach of Article II of the Genocide Convention, act (e) “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group”. The UN findings confirm that Uyghur children are forcibly removed from the environment, separated from their parents, forced to speak in Mandarin and punished for speaking in Uyghur. URAP urges the UN to unequivocally declare what is happening to Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims as what it is: genocide.
These egregious crimes of forced separations and institutionalized eradication of language should not be tolerated or normalized amongst the international community. The UN expert statement does not disclose unknown information, the systematic shift of the Uyghur education system and tactics of forced separation has been a long-standing tactic of the Chinese Communist Party. In fact, the facts of the statement confirm that the persisting genocidal campaign against Uyghurs has been exercised with impunity and is aided by the blind eye of the international community.
From the Canadian experience, we must recognize the tragic parallels of our past with the ongoing Uyghur Genocide. In Canada, as we work to address our country’s tarnished past and commit to righting our historic wrongs, we must also speak up on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of Uyghur and Tibetan children facing assimilation and a grave loss to their cultural and linguistic identities in present-day China.