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What is happening to the Uighurs in China?

China is accused of grossly violating the human rights of Muslims in Xinjiang, from mass-detention to forced labour. David Aaronovitch examines what's happening to the Uighurs.

The Chinese Communist Party is accused of locking up hundreds of thousands of Uighurs in internment camps. In the Uighurs' homeland in Xinjiang, the state operates a system of mass-surveillance and is accused of human rights abuses against the mainly Muslim minority including forced labour and compulsory birth control.

China says the camps are not prisons but schools for ‘thought transformation’ and it continues to deny the abuse of human rights.

David Aaronovitch asks leading experts what’s going on in Xinjiang and how is the rest of the world responding:

Rian Thum, Senior Research Fellow at the University of Nottingham
Dr Jo Smith Finley, Senior Lecturer in Chinese Studies at Newcastle University
Josh Chin deputy China Bureau Chief for the Wall Street Journal
Charles Parton Senior Associate Fellow at RUSI

Producers: Kirtseen Knight, Beth Sagar Fenton, Joe Kent
Studio manger: James Beard
Editor: Jasper Corbett.

Available now

28 minutes

Last on

Thu 16 Jul 2020 20:00

Broadcast

  • Thu 16 Jul 2020 20:00

Podcast