flag.
China is running hundreds of detention centres in
northwest Xinjiang across a network that is much bigger than
previously thought, according to research presented Thursday by an
Australian think tank.
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) said it had
identified more than 380 “suspected detention facilities” in the
region, where China is believed to have held more than one million
Uighurs and other mostly Muslim Turkic-speaking residents.
The number of facilities is around 40 percent greater than
previous estimates, the research said and has been growing despite
China’s claims that many Uighurs have been released.
Using satellite imagery, eyewitness accounts, media reports and
official construction tender documents, the institute said “at
least 61 detention sites have seen new construction and expansion
work between July 2019 and July 2020”.
Fourteen more facilities were under construction in 2020 and
around 70 have had fencing or perimeter walls removed, indicating
their use has changed or they have been closed.
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Beijing on Thursday again denied the existence of detention
sites. The government says they are vocational training centres
used to counter extremism.
Foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin called ASPI “the vanguard
of anti-China forces whose academic credibility is seriously
questionable”.
US lawmakers recently voted to ban imports from Xinjiang, citing
the alleged use of systematic forced labour.
Beijing recently published a white paper defending its policies
in Xinjiang, where it says training programmes, work schemes
and better education mean life has improved.
It claims to have given “training sessions” to an average of
1.29 million workers each year between 2014 and 2019.
Following the publication of the ASPI report, the Chinese
government-controlled nationalist tabloid Global Times cited
“sources” as saying contributors Clive Hamilton and Alex Joske were
banned from entering China.
Wang did not confirm if the two academics had been banned on
Thursday, but said the matter was “totally within the scope of
China’s sovereignty”.
AFP