The Chinese government’s internment, rape, torture, and murder of Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang “reeducation” camps, supposedly to prevent terrorism, has long been confirmed by the testimony of many of the victims.
No honest person could deny the evidence.
Nevertheless, there are denials.
In February 2021, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, uttering a standard denial, told the United Nations that “basic facts show that there has never been so-called genocide, forced labor or religious oppression in Xinjiang.”
But now a hack of China’s police computers has unearthed a trove of documents showing what is happening in the camps according to the regime itself.
The files include mug shots of prisoners and records of protocols to be followed as police subdue detainees, handcuff and blindfold them while moving them between buildings, and shoot to kill anyone who tries to escape.
The xinjianpolicefiles.org site also hosts an explanation of the files by Adrian Denz, an expert on Chinese documents.
The “thousands of documents, speeches, policy directives, spreadsheets, images” come “directly from police computers in two ethnic minority counties in Xinjiang,” Denz says. “They for the first time give us a firsthand account of police operations inside reeducation camps.”
Unsurprisingly, they confirm the involvement of government officials.
Basic facts, abundantly documented.
Can Chinese officials still deny them?
Yes, but the job of controverting the incontrovertible is harder now. It will also be harder for appeasers in the West to pretend that none of this horror matters.
