South Asia and Beyond

China Systematically, Coercively Lowering Uyghur Births: Academic Adrian Zenz

NEW DELHI: It’s the strongest proof yet that atrocities in the Chinese autonomous region of Xinjiang fulfill a UN genocide convention criteria, says China Studies Academic Dr Adrian Zenz about his research published this week on birth prevention and mass female sterilisation of Uyghur and other minorities. Speaking to Stratnew Global Associate Editor Amitabh P. Revi, Dr Zenz outlined the draconian suppression of population growth with evidence through government documents in Mandarin of a campaign of mass sterilisation coupled with 2 million new Han residents being lured to the area with lucrative state jobs and free homes. He says coercive family planning halved population growth rates in 2018 and lowered them further by 30-56 per cent in 2019 with one prefecture setting a near-zero growth target. “Technically, the government can now dial minority birth rates up and down at will, like opening or closing a faucet,” says Dr Zenz.

On the Chinese foreign ministry, embassies and media criticising his research as ‘lies’, he counters, saying they’re citing past Uyghur population growth rates which actually supports his findings. With support coming in from politicians around the world including the Inter Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), Dr Zenz wants a ‘systematic pushback to confront the UN with his research’ to make sure China doesn’t get away with these atrocities.

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Dr Zenz’s research ‘Sterlisations, Forced Abortions and Mandatory Birth Control. The Chinese Communist party’s campaign to suppress Uyghur birthrates in Xinjiang’ was published on June 30, 2020 with the simultaneous publication of an Associated Press (AP) report. It was a collaboration, Dr Zenz says, “with AP obtaining powerful witness testimonies, while I analysed population and birth control statistics and uncovered key government documents”.

Amitabh P. Revi

Russian language speaker and conflict journalist. Amitabh Revi has been there, done that—from the battlefields of Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan to sublime Russia, Australia and the United States. Along the way he's picked up the Dag Hammarskjöld Distinguished Journalist Fellowship, the Ramnath Goenka award for coverage of the Iraq War and RT's Khaled Alkhateb Award for his reporting from Palmyra, Syria.

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