Amid accusations of genocide from the West, China policies could cut millions of Uyghur births in Xinjiang – report

This photo taken on June 4, 2019 shows police officers patrolling in Kashgar, in China's western Xinjiang region. (AFP)
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Updated 07 June 2021
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Amid accusations of genocide from the West, China policies could cut millions of Uyghur births in Xinjiang – report

  • China has previously said the current drop in ethnic minority birth rates is due to the full implementation of the region’s existing birth quotas as well as development factors, including an increase in per capita income

BEIJING: Chinese birth control policies could cut between 2.6 to 4.5 million births of the Uyghur and other ethnic minorities in southern Xinjiang within 20 years, up to a third of the region’s projected minority population, according to a new analysis by a German researcher.
The report, shared exclusively with Reuters ahead of publication, also includes a previously unreported cache of research produced by Chinese academics and officials on Beijing’s intent behind the birth control policies in Xinjiang, where official data shows birth-rates have already dropped by 48.7 percent between 2017 and 2019.
Adrian Zenz’s research comes amid growing calls among some western countries for an investigation into whether China’s actions in Xinjiang amount to genocide, a charge Beijing vehemently denies.
The research by Zenz is the first such peer reviewed analysis of the long-term population impact of Beijing’s multi-year crackdown in the western region. Rights groups, researchers and some residents say the policies include newly enforced birth limits on Uyghur and other mainly Muslim ethnic minorities, the transfers of workers to other regions and the internment of an estimated one million Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in a network of camps.
“This (research and analysis) really shows the intent behind the Chinese government’s long-term plan for the Uyghur population,” Zenz told Reuters.
The Chinese government has not made public any official target for reducing the proportion of Uyghur and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. But based on analysis of official birth data, demographic projections and ethnic ratios proposed by Chinese academics and officials, Zenz estimates Beijing’s policies could increase the predominant Han Chinese population in southern Xinjiang to around 25 percent from 8.4 percent currently.
“This goal is only achievable if they do what they have been doing, which is drastically suppressing (Uyghur) birth rates,” Zenz said.
China has previously said the current drop in ethnic minority birth rates is due to the full implementation of the region’s existing birth quotas as well as development factors, including an increase in per capita income and wider access to family planning services.
“The so-called ‘genocide’ in Xinjiang is pure nonsense,” China’s Foreign Ministry told Reuters in a statement. “It is a manifestation of the ulterior motives of anti-China forces in the United States and the West and the manifestation of those who suffer from Sinophobia.”
Official data showing the decrease in Xinjiang birth rates between 2017 and 2019 “does not reflect the true situation” and Uyghur birth rates remain higher than Han ethnic people in Xinjiang, the ministry added.
The new research compares a population projection done by Xinjiang-based researchers for the government-run Chinese Academy of Sciences based on data predating the crackdown, to official data on birth-rates and what Beijing describes as “population optimization” measures for Xinjiang’s ethnic minorities introduced since 2017.
It found the population of ethnic minorities in Uyghur-dominated southern Xinjiang would reach between 8.6-10.5 million by 2040 under the new birth prevention policies. That compares to 13.14 million projected by Chinese researchers using data pre-dating the implemented birth policies and a current population of around 9.47 million.
Zenz, an independent researcher with the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, a bipartisan non-profit based in Washington, D.C., has previously been condemned by Beijing for his research which has been critical of China’s policies on detaining Uyghurs, mass labor transfers and birth reduction in Xinjiang.
China’s foreign ministry has accused Zenz of “misleading” people with data and, in response to Reuters’ questions, said “his lies aren’t worth refuting.”
Zenz’s research was accepted for publication by the Central Asian Survey, a quarterly academic journal, after peer review on June 3.
Reuters shared the research and methodology with more than a dozen experts in population analysis, birth prevention policies and international human rights law, who said the analysis and conclusions were sound.
Some of the experts cautioned that demographic projections over a period of decades can be affected by unforeseen factors. The Xinjiang government has not publicly set official ethnic quota or population size goals for ethnic populations in Southern Xinjiang, and quotas used in the analysis are based on proposed figures from Chinese officials and academics.

’END UYGHUR DOMINANCE’
The move to prevent births among Uyghur and other minorities is in sharp contrast with China’s wider birth policies.
Last week, Beijing announced married couples can have three children, up from two, the largest such policy shift since the one child policy was scrapped in 2016 in response to China’s rapidly aging population. The announcement contained no reference to any specific ethnic groups.
Before then, measures officially limited the country’s majority Han ethnic group and minority groups including Uyghur to two children — three in rural areas. However, Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities had historically been partially excluded from those birth limits as part of preferential policies designed to benefit the minority communities.
Some residents, researchers and rights groups say the newly enforced rules now disproportionately impact Islamic minorities, who face detention for exceeding birth quotas, rather than fines as elsewhere in China.
In a Communist Party record leaked in 2020, also reported by Zenz, a re-education camp in southern Xinjiang’s Karakax county listed birth violations as the reason for internment in 149 cases out of 484 detailed in the list. China has called the list a “fabrication”.
Birth quotas for ethnic minorities have become strictly enforced in Xinjiang since 2017, including though the separation of married couples, and the use of sterilization procedures, intrauterine devices (IUDs) and abortions, three Uyghur people and one health official inside Xinjiang told Reuters.
Two of the Uyghur people said they had direct family members who were detained for having too many children. Reuters could not independently verify the detentions.
“It is not up to choice,” said the official, based in southern Xinjiang, who asked not to be named because they fear reprisals from the local government. “All Uyghurs must comply… it is an urgent task.”
The Xinjiang government did not respond to a request for comment about whether birth limits are more strictly enforced against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities. Xinjiang officials have previously said all procedures are voluntary.
Still, in Xinjiang counties where Uyghurs are the majority ethnic group, birth rates dropped 50.1 percent in 2019, for example, compared to a 19.7 percent drop in majority ethnic Han counties, according to official data compiled by Zenz.
Zenz’s report says analyzes published by state funded academics and officials between 2014 and 2020 show the strict implementation of the policies are driven by national security concerns, and are motivated by a desire to dilute the Uyghur population, increase Han migration and boost loyalty to the ruling Communist Party.
For example, 15 documents created by state funded academics and officials showcased in the Zenz report include comments from Xinjiang officials and state-affiliated academics referencing the need to increase the proportion of Han residents and decrease the ratio of Uyghurs or described the high concentration of Uyghurs as a threat to social stability.
“The problem in southern Xinjiang is mainly the unbalanced population structure … the proportion of the Han population is too low,” Liu Yilei, an academic and the deputy secretary general of the Communist Party committee of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, a government body with administrative authority in the region, told a July 2020 symposium, published on the Xinjiang University website.
Xinjiang must “end the dominance of the Uyghur group”, said Liao Zhaoyu, dean of the institute of frontier history and geography at Xinjiang’s Tarim University at an academic event in 2015, shortly before the birth policies and broader internment program were enforced in full.
Liao did not respond to a request for comment. Liu could not be reached for comment. The foreign ministry did not comment on their remarks, or on the intent behind the policies.

INTENT TO DESTROY?
Zenz and other experts point to the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which lists birth prevention targeting an ethnic group as one act that could qualify as genocide.
The United States government and parliaments in countries including Britain and Canada have described China’s birth prevention and mass detention policies in Xinjiang as genocide.
However, some academics and politicians say there is insufficient evidence of intent by Beijing to destroy an ethnic population in part or full to meet the threshold for a genocide determination.
No such formal criminal charges have been laid against Chinese or Xinjiang officials because of a lack of available evidence on and insight into the policies in the region. Prosecuting officials would also be complex and require a high bar of proof.
Additionally, China is not party to the International Criminal Court (ICC), the top international court that prosecutes genocide and other serious crimes, and which can only bring action against states within its jurisdiction.


Inspired by diabetic father, Bangladeshi man’s juice recipes go viral in Ramadan

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Inspired by diabetic father, Bangladeshi man’s juice recipes go viral in Ramadan

  • Imran Ahmed Saudagar started making healthy fresh juices for his father during COVID-19 pandemic
  • His first viral juice video, a Goa Lemon recipe based on a Nando’s drink, got 2 million views

DHAKA: In a two-minute video, Imran Ahmed Saudagar playfully juggles wood apples before cracking them open, scooping out the flesh, and blending it with jaggery, salt, and water into a creamy juice — one of his signature recipes, which for the past few years have accompanied Bangladeshi netizens during Ramadan.

The wood apple juice video was Saudagar’s first this fasting month and it immediately drew the attention of the tens of thousands of his followers, who welcomed back the “much awaited series” and the “Shorbot Saudagar Season.”

The word “shorbot” means “juice” in Bengali, and Shorbot With Saudagar is what the Dhaka-based advertising professional and accidental healthy juice influencer called his short recipe videos, which he started during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The inspiration to create the recipes came from his late father.

“He was around 75 years old at the time. And he started refusing all kinds of fruits. So, I started creating different combinations of fruits and blended them together to make a new juice every day,” Saudagar told Arab News.

As he mixed new ingredients, his father enjoyed guessing them by taste and looked forward to the juice game the next day.

To make sure his father consumed what was beneficial, Saudagar consulted his doctors and sought help from nutritionists while preparing new blends.

Initially a family affair, the juices started to reach a wider audience a few months later, when Saudagar got married and his wife suggested that they should record the recipes.

“We started researching what kind of crockery I should use to cut the fruits, what fruit should we buy, what are the best fruit combinations. We discussed it every night and we started making different juices every day,” he said.

Their first viral blend was inspired by a Goa Lemon juice they tried at the fast chain Nando’s. Saudagar recalled it was with yoghurt, mint and lime, to which he added some vanilla ice cream.

“It was a blast. People started loving it. They tried it at home, and they were saying: ‘Oh man, this is like the original Goa Lemon,’” he said.

“I didn’t have the recipe. I just tried making it and it happened. The Goa Lemon video was (viewed by) around 2 million people.”

While pursuing a corporate career, Saudagar did the videos only in his free time but tried to make more, especially during the month of fasting, as his fans inspired him to do so.

“People started knocking to me just before the day Ramadan started: ‘Brother, when is Shorbot With Saudagar coming? When are you making new juice? When are you making new recipes?’” he said.

“Every day, people were commenting and replying on my posts: ‘I’m waiting for the new recipe, new video. But the best comment was: ‘Brother, I think, Ramadan is incomplete without your videos.’”

Since he started the project, Saudagar has recorded over 70 videos. While he may be short of new local fruits to explore, as he has already tried most of them, this fasting month he will try to develop some fruit-based electrolyte drinks.

“I’m still researching how to make it,” he said. “That should be one new thing. And also, I want to add more smoothies to help you with stomach health and digestion. You need to be healthy during Ramadan.”


US envoy visits Moscow for ceasefire talks that a Russian official says would help Ukraine

Updated 15 min 57 sec ago
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US envoy visits Moscow for ceasefire talks that a Russian official says would help Ukraine

  • The diplomatic development coincided with a Russian claim that its troops have driven the Ukrainian army out of a key town in Russia’s Kursk border region
  • Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Russia for talks with officials on the US ceasefire proposal

MOSCOW: An envoy of US President Donald Trump arrived in Moscow on Thursday for talks on an American-proposed 30-day ceasefire that Ukraine has accepted but which a senior Russian official said would help Kyiv by giving its weary and shorthanded military a break, three years after Russia’s full-scale invasion.
The diplomatic development coincided with a Russian claim that its troops have driven the Ukrainian army out of a key town in Russia’s Kursk border region, where Moscow has been trying for seven months to dislodge Ukrainian troops from their foothold.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Russia for talks with officials on the US ceasefire proposal, according to a US official who wasn’t authorized to comment on the matter.
The Russian Defense Ministry’s claim that it recaptured the town of Sudzha, a Ukrainian operational hub in Kursk, hours after President Vladimir Putin visited his commanders in Kursk and wore military fatigues, couldn’t be independently verified. Ukrainian officials made no immediate comment on the claim.
The renewed Russian military push and Putin’s high-profile visit to his troops came as US President Donald Trump presses for a diplomatic end to the war. The US on Tuesday lifted its March 3 suspension of military aid for Kyiv after senior US and Ukrainian officials made progress on how to stop the fighting during talks held in Saudi Arabia.
Trump said Wednesday that “it’s up to Russia now” as his administration presses Moscow to agree to the ceasefire. The US president has made veiled threats to hit Russia with new sanctions if it won’t engage with peace efforts.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov wouldn’t comment on Moscow’s view of the ceasefire proposal.
“Before the talks start, and they haven’t started yet, it would be wrong to talk about it in public,” he told reporters.
Senior US officials say they hope to see Russia stop attacks on Ukraine within the next few days.
But Yuri Ushakov, Putin’s foreign policy adviser, complained in televised remarks Thursday that a ceasefire would grant a “temporary break for the Ukrainian military.”
Speaking later to reporters in the Kremlin, Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, reaffirmed that the US-proposed ceasefire would “give us nothing,” adding that it would “only give the Ukrainians a chance to regroup, consolidate their forces and keep doing the same in the future.”
Ushakov wouldn’t comment on Witkoff’s talks in Moscow on Thursday, saying that the parties agreed to keep them confidential.
Ushakov said that Moscow wants a “long-term peaceful settlement that takes into account Moscow’s interests and concerns.” His comments came a day after his phone call with Waltz.
Ushakov’s comments echoed statements from Putin, who has repeatedly said a temporary ceasefire would benefit Ukraine and its Western allies.
Ukraine has leveled similar accusations to Ushakov’s, claiming Russia would use a truce to regroup and rearm.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky chided Russia on his Telegram messaging app Thursday for what he said was its slow response to the ceasefire proposal, accusing Moscow of trying to delay any peace deal. He said that Ukraine is “determined to move quickly toward peace” and hoped US pressure would compel Russia to stop fighting.
The US still has about $3.85 billion in congressionally authorized funding for future arms shipments to Ukraine, but the Trump administration has shown no interest so far in using that authority to send additional weapons as it awaits the outcome of peace overtures.
By signaling its openness to a ceasefire, Ukraine has presented the Kremlin with a dilemma at a time when the Russian military has the upper hand in the war — whether to accept a truce and abandon hopes of making new gains, or reject the offer and risk derailing a cautious rapprochement with Washington.
The Ukrainian army’s foothold inside Russia has been under intense pressure for months from a renewed effort by Russian forces, backed by North Korean troops. Ukraine’s daring incursion last August led to the first occupation of Russian soil by foreign troops since World War II and embarrassed the Kremlin.
Speaking to commanders Wednesday, Putin said that he expected the military “to completely free the Kursk region from the enemy in the nearest future.”
Putin added that “it’s necessary to think about creating a security zone alongside the state border,” in a signal that Moscow could try to expand its territorial gains by capturing parts of Ukraine’s neighboring Sumy region. That idea could complicate a ceasefire deal.
Ukraine launched the raid in a bid to counter the unceasingly glum news from the front line, as well as draw Russian troops away from the battlefield inside Ukraine and gain a bargaining chip in any peace talks. But the incursion didn’t significantly change the dynamic of the war.
The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, assessed late Wednesday that Russian forces were in control of Sudzha, a town close to the border that previously was home to about 5,000 people.
Ukraine’s top military commander, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, said late Wednesday that Russian aviation had carried out an unprecedented number of strikes on Kursk and that as a result Sudzha had been almost completely destroyed. He didn’t comment on whether Ukraine still controlled the settlement, but said it was “maneuvering (troops) to more advantageous lines.”
Meanwhile, Maj. Gen. Dmytro Krasylnykov, commander of Ukraine’s Northern Operational Command, which includes the Kursk region, was dismissed from his post, he told Ukrainian media outlet Suspilne on Wednesday. He told the outlet that he wasn’t given a reason for his dismissal, saying “I’m guessing, but I don’t want to talk about it yet.”


UK seeks tougher term for father jailed over daughter’s murder

Updated 29 min 10 sec ago
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UK seeks tougher term for father jailed over daughter’s murder

  • Urfan Sharif was jailed in December for murdering 10-year-old Sara Sharif following years of torture
  • Lawyers for the Solicitor General’s office are at the same time seeking a stiffer, indefinite, sentence for Sharif

LONDON: The father of a British-Pakistani girl jailed for 40 years for her murder should have been given a whole life sentence from which he would never be released, a top government lawyer argued in a court appeal hearing Thursday.
Urfan Sharif was jailed in December for murdering 10-year-old Sara Sharif following years of torture.
Sharif, Sara’s stepmother Beinash Batool and the child’s uncle, Faisal Malik, are all appealing their sentences at the Court of Appeal in London.
Lawyers for the Solicitor General’s office are at the same time seeking a stiffer, indefinite, sentence for Sharif.
The murder trial last year caused waves of revulsion in the UK as the horrific abuse suffered by Sara was revealed.
There was anger too at how the bright, bubbly youngster had been failed by the authorities supposed to be in charge of her care.
Her body was found in bed at the family home in August 2023 covered in bites and bruises with broken bones and burns inflicted by an electric iron and boiling water.
Lawyer Naeem Majid Mian, representing Urfan Sharif, who was 43 when he was sentenced, argued in court on Thursday that although Sara’s treatment had been “horrendous” it did not merit his 40-year sentence.
“There was no intention to kill... and (the death) was not premeditated,” he added.
But documents submitted to the court on behalf of the solicitor general, one of the government’s top legal officers, called for Sharif to have an indefinite sentence imposed.
“It is submitted that the judge was wrong not to impose a whole life order on the offender,” said lawyer Tom Little in a text submission.
“This case does cross that... threshold” of rare cases that can justify a whole life term.
A lawyer for Sara’s stepmother, Carline Carberry, also told the court that her sentence of 33 years was too long and did not “justly reflect her role.”
Passing sentence in December after the trial, judge John Cavanagh said Sara had been subjected to “acts of extreme cruelty” but that Sharif and Batool had not shown “a shred of remorse.”
They had treated Sara as “worthless” and as “a skivvy,” because she was a girl. And because she was not Batool’s natural child, the stepmother had failed to protect her, he said.
“This poor child was battered with great force again and again.”
Malik, 29, who lived with the family was sentenced to 16 years after being found guilty of causing or allowing her death. He is also seeking to appeal his term.
A post-mortem examination of Sara’s body revealed she had 71 fresh injuries and at least 25 broken bones.
She had been beaten with a metal pole and cricket bat and “trussed up” with a “grotesque combination of parcel tape, a rope and a plastic bag” over her head.
A hole was cut in the bag so she could breathe and she was left to soil herself in nappies as she was prevented from using the bathroom.
Police called the case “one of the most difficult and distressing” that they had ever had to deal with.
The day after Sara died, the three adults fled their home in Woking, southwest of London, and flew to Pakistan with five other children.
Her father, a taxi-driver, left behind a handwritten note saying he had not meant to kill his daughter.
After a month on the run, the three returned to the UK and were arrested after landing. The five other children remain in Pakistan.
There has been anger in the UK that Sara’s brutal treatment was missed by social services after her father withdrew her from school four months before she died.
Sharif and his first wife, Olga, were well-known to social services.
In 2019, a judge decided to award the care of Sara and an older brother to Sharif, despite his history of abuse.
The school had three times raised the alarm about Sara’s case, notably after she arrived in class wearing a hijab, which she used to try to cover marks on her body which she refused to explain.
Since December, the government has moved to tighten up the rules on home-schooling.
Sara’s body was repatriated to Poland, where her mother is from, and where a funeral was organized.


Nominee for White House briefing role pulled over Gaza war stance

Updated 37 min 35 sec ago
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Nominee for White House briefing role pulled over Gaza war stance

  • Daniel Davis called US support for Israel’s campaign a ‘stain on our character’
  • Senior Republicans opposed his appointment as deputy director for mission integration

LONDON: US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard decided against appointing a critic of Israel’s war in Gaza to a top government post over fears that doing so would anger members of President Donald Trump’s administration.

Daniel Davis, a senior fellow at the Defense Priorities think tank in Washington, was under consideration for the role of deputy director for mission integration, in charge of — among other things — putting together the president’s daily intelligence briefings.

However, a source within the administration told the New York Times that Gabbard reconsidered the appointment after Davis’s recommendation received criticism from several of her colleagues, Republican members of Congress, and other right-wing bodies and figures over his stance on Israel.

Davis wrote on social media in January that US support for the Gaza war was a “stain on our character as a nation, as a culture, that will not soon go away.”

On Wednesday, the Anti-Defamation League said his appointment would be “extremely dangerous.”

Marc Polymeropoulos, a former CIA operations officer, said Davis’s stance on the conflict ran contrary to mainstream Republican positions.

“His overt criticism of Israel and total opposition to any military action against Iran seems to run counter to current administration policy,” added Polymeropoulos, a fellow at the Atlantic Council.

The NYT reported that “allies” of Davis said there was “no hint of antisemitism or opposition to Israel in his work.”

Davis is known to be skeptical of US involvement in a number of overseas conflicts, in line with the position of Defense Priorities, which has called for less American involvement in the Middle East and an end to the war in Ukraine.

Davis has also been vocal about the suffering of Palestinians, calling plans to remove people from Gaza “ethnic cleansing.”

Gabbard is also a skeptic of US overseas intervention, and while she has said little about Gaza in recent months, Davis has been vocal on social media in supporting similar stances to her on conflicts such as Ukraine and the transition in Syria. 

However, the Trump administration is known to be split on foreign policy directions the president should pursue, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and National Security Advisor Michael Waltz known to be more hawkish, especially on US policy toward Iran.


France and its partners will not yield to US threats, says French trade minister

Updated 59 min 59 sec ago
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France and its partners will not yield to US threats, says French trade minister

  • “France remains determined to respond with the European Commission and our partners,” Saint-Martin wrote on X

PARIS: France and its partners, such as the European Union, will not yield to US tariff threats and France will protect its industries, said French trade minister Laurent Saint Martin on Thursday.
“Donald Trump is launching the escalation in the trade war he chose to start. France remains determined to respond with the European Commission and our partners,” Saint-Martin wrote on X.
US President Donald Trump said earlier that the US will put 200 percent tariff on all wines and other alcoholic products if the EU does not remove tariff on whiskey.