All Reading
This section contains a curated list of useful articles, investigations, books and other reading materials. The list is updated on a weekly basis and suggestions for additions are welcome.
Starting Points:
Cultural Heritage and Mass Atrocities
Assembling dozens of experts from the heritage, social science, humanitarian, legal, and military communities, this open-access book features a series of essays on the global value of cultural heritage, recent examples of intentional cultural heritage destruction across the globe, and how it can be protected.
Unemployment Monitoring and Early Warning: New Trends in Xinjiang’s Coercive Labor Placement Systems
This new report charts concerning new trends in Xinjiang forced labor as the region now mandates "every able-bodied person to achieve stable employment," and keeps transferred Uyghurs in their place through an unemployment monitoring/surveillance system.
The Xinjiang Police Files: Re-Education Camp Security and Political Paranoia in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
Previously, witnesses and leaked state documents outlined the securitised nature of China’s re-education facilities. Now, the “Xinjiang Police Files,” a major cache of classified files from internal XUAR police networks, provides an unprecedented inside view. This article authenticates and contextualises the Xinjiang Police Files within the growing field of published internal XUAR government documents.
The Crisis in Xinjiang: What’s Happening Now and What Does it Mean?
Policies implemented by the CCP in Xinjiang since 2016 have become a central issue in PRC international relations. This talk reviews the Xinjiang crisis to date and suggests how we should understand these events and trends.
The Xinjiang Papers: An Analysis of Key Findings and Implications for the Uyghur Tribunal in London
This report, submitted to the Uyghur Tribunal, contains a detailed analysis of the Xinjiang Papers and what this evidence indicates about the central government’s role in Xinjiang policies, as well as the author’s resulting conclusions on the question of genocide.
The Xinjiang Papers: An Introduction
This report, submitted to the Uyghur Tribunal, contains a detailed overview of the Xinjiang Papers, a cache of leaked - and mostly classified - government documents from the PRC.
Genocidal processes: social death in Xinjiang
This paper builds on critical genocide studies literature to historically contextualize China’s “fusion” policy used to justify its policies of extralegal internment camps and inter-generational separation in Xinjiang.
Evidence of the Chinese Central Government’s Knowledge of and Involvement in Xinjiang’s Re-Education Internment Campaign
Documents leaked to the New York Times (also known as the Xinjiang Papers) in November 2019 revealed how Chinese President Xi Jinping laid the groundwork. Now, previously unanalyzed central government and state media commentary surrounding the introduction of the crucial March 2017 “XUAR De-Extremification Regulation” show that several important central government institutions were closely and directly involved in the drafting and even approval of this key legislation.
Coercive Labor and Forced Displacement in Xinjiang’s Cross-Regional Labor Transfer Program
This report provides new evidence from Chinese sources that Xinjiang’s labor transfers to other regions or provinces in China meet the forced labor definition of the International Labor Organization (ILO). The report develops a process-focused evaluation model for evaluating coercion at each stage of the labor transfer program. The Nankai Report, along with other Chinese academic sources, indicates that labor transfers are not just serving economic purposes, but are implemented with the intention to forcibly displace ethnic minority populations from their heartlands, intentionally reducing their population density, and tearing apart homogeneous communities.
The Spatial Cleansing of Xinjiang: Mazar Desecration in Context
Since March 2018, the Chinese state has destroyed and desecrated Uyghur historical and holy places at a scale unprecedented in the history of Eastern Turkistan (Xinjiang), among them the sacred mazars.
Addressing Forced Labor in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region: Toward a Shared Agenda
The forced labor of ethnic and religious minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), as part of a broader pattern of severe human rights abuses, is a significant and growing concern that demands the attention of governments and private-sector actors across the world. Products entering the United States, Europe, and other democracies are at risk of being affected by these forced labor practices, which often occur several steps away from global brands in supply chains.
This brief explores what the XUAR produces, the sectors that are implicated, the resulting sourcing challenges, and the opportunities for collective action to be explored in further research.
Sterilizations, IUDs, and mandatory birth control: The CCP’s campaign to suppress Uyghur birthrates in Xinjiang
This report presents detailed analysis of another troubling aspect of state policy in Xinjiang: measures to forcibly suppress birthrates among ethnic Uyghur communities, to include the mass application of mandatory birth control and sterilizations.
Uyghur Human Rights Protection Act & the U.S. Chinese Struggle
This analysis of the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act (UHRPA) examines how it seeks to pressure China to cease its mass internment, surveillance, and repression of its mostly Muslim Uyghur population.
The Karakax List: Dissecting the Anatomy of Beijing’s Internment Drive in Xinjiang
The “Karakax List”, named after the county of Karakax (Qaraqash) in Hotan Prefecture, represents the most recent leaked government document from Xinjiang. Over 137 pages, 667 data rows and the personal details of over 3,000 Uyghurs, this document presents the strongest evidence to date that Beijing is actively persecuting and punishing normal practices of traditional religious beliefs, in direct violation of its own constitution.
A Uighurs’ History of China
It is impossible to make sense of the current crisis in Xinjiang without an understanding of the distinctive trajectory of Uighur history, which is intertwined with that of the regional great power, China.
“Wash Brains, Cleanse Hearts”: Evidence from Chinese Government Documents about the Nature and Extent of Xinjiang’s Extrajudicial Internment Campaign
As China’s internment and related propaganda campaign progresses, this article provides crucial incriminating evidence about the real nature and purpose of the region’s “Vocational Skills Education Training Centers” network. The empirical evidence discussed within should suffice to support significant, concrete actions by the international community against this unprecedented atrocity.
Securitizing Xinjiang: Police Recruitment, Informal Policing and Ethnic Minority Co-optation
Following a series of high-profile attacks in Beijing, Kunming and Urumqi by Uyghur militants, the Chinese party-state declared a war on terror in 2014. Since then, China's Xinjiang region has witnessed an unprecedented build-up of what we describe as a multi-tiered police force, turning it into one of the most heavily policed regions in the world. This article investigates the securitization of Xinjiang through an analysis of official police recruitment documents.
Beyond the Camps: Beijing's Grand Scheme of Forced Labor, Poverty Alleviation and Social Control in Xinjiang
This report discusses how the state's long-term stability maintenance strategy in Xinjiang is predicated upon a combination of forced labor, family separation and social control under the guise of "poverty alleviation".
Brainwashing, Police Guards and Coercive Internment: Evidence from Chinese Government Documents about the Nature and Extent of Xinjiang’s “Vocational Training Internment Camps
Based on the government’s own statements, this article seeks to decisively refute the Chinese government’s propaganda claims that about its “Vocational Skills Education Training Centers”. Official documents and related media reports that are not designed for international audiences paint a very different picture of these “centers” – a picture that confirms the growing body of first-hand witness accounts.
“United Front.” Afterlives of Chinese Communism: Political Concepts from Mao to Xi
The notion of 'united front' was first adopted by the Chinese Communist Party in the early 1920s, and was originally connected to the tactic of cross-class mobilisation. In time, the original concept took on a broader meaning, coming to refer to the CCP's ability to work with, unite under its guidance, and manipulate other political parties and social forces, eliminating possible sources of opposition by means of cooptation and control.