The news made headlines in China’s state media: The United Nations’ human rights chief, during her long-awaited visit to the country, spoke to her family. China’s leader, Xi Jinping. An article published on the website of Xinhua, the state news agency, relayed Mr. Xi’s claim that the Chinese people are enjoying “unprecedented” rights. The article then quoted the UN official, Michelle Bachelet.
“I admire China’s efforts and achievements in eradicating poverty, protecting human rights, and realizing social and economic development,” she said, according to Xinhua.
But within hours, Ms. Bachelet’s office denied it. It points to “her actual opening statement,” not to mention admiring China’s record of rights.
It was a vivid illustration of the narrative battle of Miss Bachelet’s visit, The first UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to visit China since 2005. When Miss Bachelet first offered to visit, she describes it as an opportunity to independently examine China’s human rights landscape, particularly in the western region of Xinjiang, where scholars and human rights groups suggest a million or more Uyghurs, Kazakhs and members of other predominantly Muslim groups was held in seminary camps.
But as the trip unfolds this week, it has instead become the new material for Chinese propaganda about the region.
The government, before agreeing to allow Ms. Bachelet’s visit, to include Xinjiang, insisted that the visit was “friendly”. Chinese officials have threatened overseas Uighurs who ask Ms. Bachelet to seek information about their relatives. Even Ms. Bachelet privately acknowledges the challenge of ensuring meetings are not formally monitored.
What Ms. Bachelet can see, and what she says about it, could have major implications for efforts to hold China accountable for its alleged behaviour. Critics say an elaborately choreographed tour will only give legitimacy to denying government wrongdoing in Xinjiang.
“This visit has been used by China as propaganda to cover up the heinous crimes that are taking place,” said Mehmet Tohti, executive director of the Ottawa-based Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project. out of them.
In recent years, Chinese authorities have significantly expanded the police presence in Xinjiang, demolishing mosques and rounding religious leaders and intellectuals. People have participated in work programs that experts say can lead to forced labor. The United States has deemed the persecution a genocide. Chinese officials have denied the accusations, saying their crackdown in Xinjiang is aimed at guiding Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities away from religious extremism.
On Tuesday, a collection of media outlets, including the BBC, reported on an extensive cache of internal Chinese police records that further details the extent of repression in Xinjiang. Documents obtained by scholar Adrian Zenz, including orders for guards to shoot to kill escapees who refused to stop, as well as a speech by a top security official, were given during a meeting closed, citing Xi’s order to expand detention facilities.
Thousands of photos in the cache show some people being held in mass detention. The youngest detainee photographed was 15 years old, the oldest 73. One woman had tears in her eyes, another sign that the camps are much more than the vocational training programs offered by the authorities. described them.
Spokesperson of the Chinese government dismiss documents such as “smear the anti-China forces”. Ms Bachelet, who did not accompany reporters on her trip, did not immediately address the new evidence.
Miss Bachelet requested access to China since coming to power in 2018, citing “deeply disturbing” allegations of mistreatment of the Uighurs. But Chinese officials have denied any visit seen as an investigation. In December, a spokeswoman for Ms. Bachelet’s office said that although negotiations had stalled, a separate report on conditions in Xinjiang, had also been in the works for many years, will be published for several weeks; He added that the office had “identified patterns of arbitrary detention and ill-treatment.”
But the report was not released. Then, in March, Mrs. Bachelet .’s office surprise announcement that she has secured a visit in May.
Her office did not disclose the terms of the trip, which ends Saturday, including who she will meet and under what circumstances. Even the exact date was not announced until three days before her arrival.
In the absence of information, competing stories about the trip emerged. Uyghurs abroad, Western governments and human rights groups have warned that Ms Bachelet risks becoming a tool for Beijing’s attempt to whitewash its crackdown.
China has described the trip as an opportunity for Ms. Bachelet to see Xinjiang unencumbered by Western prejudices, and see the success of efforts to boost the region’s economy while prevent terrorism and religious extremism.
Xu Guixiang, a spokesman for the Xinjiang regional government, denied the charges of genocide, forced labor and detention. “If they want to see this, they should go to the United States,” he say at a press conference.
China has also made more coercive efforts to control the narrative.
Kalbinur Gheni, a Uighur living in Virginia, said security officials threatened her family in Xinjiang after she appealed online to Ms. Bachelet. She has called on her to investigate the case of her sister, Renagul, who she believes is serving a 17-year prison sentence for religious activities, including praying at their father’s funeral, although there is no information. any official report on her crimes.
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Ms. Gheni said that after she posted her message on Twitter, Chinese officials contacted her on the WeChat platform. “They said, ‘Yesterday we went to visit your mother. She did not do well. She’s sick, you need to think about her. You have put her in a situation like this,” Mrs Gheni said.
Her mother called and begged her to stop. A brother in Xinjiang, whom she hasn’t seen in years, also texted her to urge her not to criticize the government. Ms. Gheni said she believed the warnings were the result of threats against her relatives from Chinese officials worried about bad publicity during Ms. Bachelet’s visit. “I think they just wanted to lock me up,” she said.
Ms. Bachelet herself is also less revealing. On the first day of her visit, she hosted a phone call with representatives of dozens of countries, including many diplomats based in Beijing. Some have raised concerns about her level of access, according to three people on the call, who requested anonymity to discuss the private conversation.
Ms. Bachelet reassured the participants that she could read mid-stream what she saw, they said. She said she had arranged several meetings independently with the government, though she did not elaborate, citing safety concerns. And she said she would visit a detention center, though she did not say whether it was arranged by the government.
Some of Ms. Bachelet’s public comments are largely illogical. Her opening remarks to Xi, as her office said, did not raise concerns about China’s human rights record. When the official UN account on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform, shared news of her visit, it is quoted Foreign Minister Wang Yi said that Ms. Bachelet would see a “Xinjiang region where peace and stability are maintained, and people of all ethnicities live in harmony”.
When Ms. Bachelet’s office clarified her comments to Mr. Xi, it did not specify whether it contradicted Xinhua, only citing “widely reported remarks”.
Activists and diplomats admit that it is not known what Ms. Bachelet, or her office’s report, will say in the end. Uyghur activists abroad met Ms. Bachelet and shared their experiences.
Philip AlstonA former United Nations Human Rights Council special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, said it was important for Ms Bachelet to engage with China, even if her ability to access them was limited. near.
“China is not any other country. It’s a big player,” Mr Alston said in an online discussion on Friday. “At some point, it was necessary to be more realistic.”
But China’s growing global power could also shape what is said about that engagement.
China in recent years has exercise significant influence on the Human Rights Council, working closely with the commissioner’s office, said Yaoyao Dai, a political science professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte who studies Chinese propaganda. If the report ends up being positive, China may see it as a vindication.
And if not, she continued, China could fire the commissioner’s office as a tool of the enemy. Either way, state media has a strategy to respond, she said.
Joy Dong research contributions.
