From Cullen Hendrix and Marcus Noland at Peterson Institute for International Economics, “Assessing Potential Economic Policy Responses to Genocide in Xinjiang” – Economic Policy Responses:
Broad trade sanctions tend to work only when the target is small and weak, the international community is united, and the targeted policy or behavior is not a core value of the target regime (Hufbauer et al. 2009). Given China’s centrality to the global trading system, the imposition of comprehensive sanctions by a broad coalition of countries is not in the cards. Nevertheless, sanctions may have a role to play by conveying disapproval and insulating the sanctioning countries’ economies from products produced under objectionable conditions. Sanctions may also act as a lever to encourage private firms to more tightly monitor supply chains and increase due diligence. Subnationally targeted sanctions, such as the United States’ ban on cotton and tomatoes produced in Xinjiang (but not the whole of China), follow this logic. They could be expanded to include a broader set of products and firms. Action to date has consisted of a limited number of targeted sanctions and partial trade bans. Before the January 2021 US ban on cotton and tomatoes, trade between the United States and Xinjiang had been rising sharply, from a small base. According to Chinese data, in the first quarter of 2021, Xinjiang’s direct exports to the United States reached $64.4 million, 46.5 percent above first quarter of 2019.
US trade law permits Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to seize any shipment of goods that enters the United States that included forced labor anywhere in the supply chain. The mechanism by which this seizure occurs is called a Withhold Release Order (WRO). CBP can determine that certain red flags indicate forced labor (unless the firm can establish otherwise). The inferential approach is necessitated by the inability to conduct traditional fact
finding in Xinjiang. Canada and the United Kingdom have also imposed bans on Xinjiang cotton. The European Union is considering adopting a similar law to ban products produced using forced labor.Another challenge is that supply chains tainted by Xinjiang forced labor now extend beyond the region and agricultural commodities and industrial metals. Implementing an effective WRO policy will require expansion of CBP resources devoted to the issue, necessitating either a redirection of resources from other tasks or an expansion of the CBP budget. Schneider (2020) recommends increasing the annual budget allocated to the CBP’s forced labor division,
charged with enforcing WROs, from $2 million to $100 million.One possibility would be to turn presumption on its head, by banning imports from Xinjiang unless the absence of forced labor can be certified. CBP could then devote its limited resources to identifying acceptable enterprises or shipments rather than trying to root out specific violations. A bipartisan proposal in the US House of Representatives—the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which would have created a “rebuttable presumption” that products made in Xinjiang are made with forced labor and prohibited from entering the United States unless “clear and convincing” evidence to the contrary is shown—passed the House by a vote of 406-3. It was reintroduced in the current session and referred to the
Committee on Foreign Affairs. In 2020 Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) introduced the Slave-Free Business Certification Act, which would mandate the auditing of third-party supply chains for any company with annual revenue greater than US$500 million. At present, the bill has been referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. In parallel, concerned governments should exclude activities in Xinjiang from their trade and investment promotion and guarantee schemes and oppose involvement by the international financial institutions in the region. Human Rights Watch (2021, p. 51) recommends that the European Commission hold off submitting the EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment to the European Parliament and Council for ratification “until reports of forced labor have been investigated by independent and impartial international experts, abuses have been addressed, victims compensated, and there is substantial progress toward holding perpetrators to account.” The Commission suspended the process following the imposition of Chinese sanctions on members of the European Parliament and European think tanks in April 2021. Beyond trade bans, governments could mandate due diligence, calling on firms to publicly disclose the names, addresses, ownership, and other relevant details about those with whom they do business in Xinjiang to prevent, mitigate, and remedy human rights abuses in their value chains. Due diligence laws have been adopted in the Netherlands and France and are being discussed at the EU level.”’
For examinations of the situation in Xinjiang, see this post.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-06/24/c_1310024904.htm
June 24, 2021
The Communist Party of China and Human Rights Protection — A 100-Year Quest
From State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China
Contents
Foreword
I. For People’s Liberation and Wellbeing
II. The Principle of Respecting and Protecting Human Rights Embedded in Governance
III. Ensuring the People’s Position as Masters of the Country
IV. Making Comprehensive Progress in Human Rights
V. Protecting the Basic Rights of Citizens in Accordance with the Law
VI. Advancing Human Rights Around the World
VII. Adding Diversity to the Concept of Human Rights
Conclusion
Wow, I’m sure all those words makes Uyghurs in the “reeducation camps” feel better, separated from their families, with not very subtle hints people will disappear if they complain publicly about the “reeducation camps” and they will never see their family members again. They must read those Beijing bureaucratic screeds every night before bed for a feeling of tranquility. Kind of like Frank Costanza “Serenity NOW!!!!!!!! Serenity NOW!!!!!!!”
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/muslims-camps-china/
https://xjdp.aspi.org.au/map/?
I hope something can be done to help them. I had several students from the Xinjiang area, which is actually pretty surprising based on where I was working, but that also shows how intent Beijing was into assimilating both Uyghurs and Tibetans into the culture of the rest of the country (and thereby, at least in part, committing cultural genocide). I even knew a girl working at a bar from Tibet (yeah different than Xinjiang but also a group abused by Beijing) who was quite the looker, and I probably inadvertently and unintentionally got her into trouble once by trying to get her to agree with me (in a semi-civilized argument I was having with the bar co-owner) that most Tibetan people couldn’t stand Han people, but refused to verbalize their strong dislike of Han for the sake of social conformity. So….. if you were ever wondering how much of a social clod I am, that story probably exhibits that pretty well. Everyone here is surprised…….. right??
I’m glad I got to know some of them they were very kind to me, and probably nicer to me than I deserved. I frequented 2–3 Xinjiang restaurants in the city I was at quite often, even though I had a mild fear they might hate me if they knew I was American—but they never showed it in their treatment of me if they did. One male waiter even ran out in the street to give me my change back after I had left the restaurant, and I was actually a little touched by the gesture he would run out and try to do right by me, even though there was no wrong that had been committed from my view of it. Many of them are obviously Muslim, but it’s what I would call a more “toned down” or “mild” version of Islamism. Chinese say that Xinjiang people have a very “westernized” or more European look to their faces—which to most Americans would seem humorous, but if you stop to think about it there’s actually a large thread of truth in it~~at least in a relative way compared to the stereotype Chinese face—but even that is hard to pigeonhole obviously.
At the 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council, 90 countries, including every predominantly Muslim country in attendance, have just rejected the accusation of genocide in China. Jeffrey Sachs and William Schabas have just written “The Xinjiang Genocide Allegations Are Unjustified.” Nonetheless, the terrifyingly false accusations are being made, the need having been prejudicially fostered to harm an entire wonderfully benign people. China always acts for the well-being of developing peoples:
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1227222.shtml
June 28, 2021
China always acts for well-being of developing countries
By Lu Xue
https://newsus.cgtn.com/news/2021-03-13/64-countries-call-for-stopping-politicization-of-human-rights–YAnYBd1wo8/index.html
March 13, 2021
Madam President,
I have the honor to speak on behalf of 64 countries.
We maintain that all sides should promote and protect human rights through constructive dialogue and cooperation and firmly oppose politicization of human rights and double standards.
We commend the people-center philosophy that the Chinese government pursues and achievements that have been made in its human rights cause. Xinjiang is an inseparable part of China. We urge the relevant sides to abide by the purposes and principles of the United Nations Charter, stop interfering in China’s internal affairs by manipulating Xinjiang related issues, refrain from making unfounded allegations against China out of political motivations and curbing the development of developing countries under the pretext of human rights.
Thank you, Madam President.
https://www.axios.com/china-uyghurs-columbia-rights-sachs-76ba9d28-a062-49cd-bf74-9f95e12a5c29.html
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OeDbBM30YgxYYPXwVO4M1m7Fa4A_vRMj/view?stream=china
From Wikipedia: ” In their 2020 book Hidden Hand, Clive Hamilton and Mareike Ohlberg comment on one of Sachs’ articles in which he accuses the U.S. government of maligning Huawei under hypocritical pretenses. Hamilton and Ohlberg write that Sachs’ article would be more meaningful and influential if he did not have a close relationship with Huawei, including his previous endorsement of the company’s “vision of our shared digital future”. The authors also allege that Sachs has ties to a number of Chinese state bodies and the private energy corporation CEFC China Energy for which he has spoken.”
https://merics.org/sites/default/files/2020-04/GPPi_MERICS_Authoritarian_Advance_2018_1.pdf
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-04/08/c_139866756.htm
April 8, 2021
Xinjiang scholars debunk “forced labor” claims with latest study
GUANGZHOU — Two scholars from northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region debunked the “forced labor” claims about Uygur workers in a recent interview with Xinhua.
Nilufer Gheyret and Chen Ning, both visiting research fellows at Jinan University in south China’s Guangdong Province, published a report in March after conducting a field research among 70 ethnic minority workers from five companies, shedding light on the Xinjiang ethnic minority workers’ employment in the province.
The report found that the top three reasons for the interviewees to work in Guangdong are the lure of high income, introduction from family members and friends, and good natural and social environment. The respondents opting for these reasons account for 36 percent, 24 percent and 15 percent of the total, respectively.
“No matter what the reason, all of them are coming to work in Guangdong out of their free will,” said Nilufer Gheyret, a Uygur herself, debunking the false claims that they are “forced” to work in the factories.
“They can go out freely whenever they want, and if they don’t want to work in this company, they can change another one or go back to their hometown in Xinjiang,” she added.
Nilufer Gheyret also noted that their report found the workers’ rights to participate in religious practices and other activities are guaranteed.
“During their working days, they can also practice their religious beliefs,” she said.
The Xinjiang workers have the same rights as their colleagues from the Han ethnic group in terms of wages, and they earn some 4,500 yuan (about 688 U.S. dollars) to 5,500 yuan a month, according to the report.
Chen said their research has found that the workers have lived happily in Guangdong, as many of them have found better educational resources for their kids, improved their work skills, or saved enough to start a new business in their hometown.
“As natives of Xinjiang, we don’t want to see such lies spread on the internet, and have an adverse effect,” said Nilufer Gheyret. “We want more people to know the real situation of these workers, and how they work and live.”
“It is their right to pursue a better life through hard work, and it is so normal all over the world,” she added.
https://english.jnu.edu.cn/2021/0423/c2027a612937/page.htm
March 31, 2021
2 JNU Researchers Publish Report on Xinjiang Minority Workers
By Xiong Chaoran
Nilufer Gheyret and Ning Chen, JNU researchers from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, spent nine months completing a detailed, comprehensive research report on members of ethnic minorities from Xinjiang working in Guangdong. They investigated five companies in Guangdong that employ 474 ethnic-minority workers from Xinjiang and interviewed 70 workers, including Uygurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and Tajiks. Their research used focus group interviews, in-depth interviews, participatory observation and other methods to study the five companies, including the two mentioned in a report published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute that denigrates the Chinese government’s labor transfer policy as an extension of forced labor.”
During the investigation, the JNU researchers found that the migrants were working outside Xinjiang of their own accord and that their work had many positive effects, including boosting their income and broadening their horizons. They also found that the rights of ethnic minority workers from Xinjiang have been fully guaranteed.
In fact, the report said, labor transfer policy is one way to achieve excellent results in national poverty alleviation, and the Chinese government, together with the people of all ethnic groups in China, has won an all-around victory in the fight against poverty and created a miracle in history….
Jinan University? I guess you do not realize that this university meddled in the 2019 Hong Kong elections in favor of the pro-China candidates by misusing personal information on their students who were from Hong Kong. Of course two people who teach at Jinan University is going to find 5 (count them 5) companies who are not abusing workers. And the point is that you want to spread PRC lies here? OK!
Uh, ltr, this has got to be one of the dumber pieces of propaganda you have posted here. So these researchers find that workers from Ximjiang are not being forced to work in Guangdong. Wow, what a surprise!
But that is not the problem, of course. The forced labor is allaegely occurring in Xinjiang, not in high income Guangdong, where indeed workers are going from all over China to get the higher wages there in its expanding economy adjacent to Hong Kong.
Please, ltr, I think you do know that most readers here do have some knowledge of China, at least enough to know that what goes on in Guangdong province does not say much about what goes on in Xinjiang province.
Let me try a feeble analogy. After the end of the Civil War, blacks were legally free to work at market wages. But of course blacks who remained in Alabama were not treated all that well. Some of the former slaves moved north to places like Boston who they may have fared better. Now getting a good job up North was not evidence that blacks in the old South were treated well.
Is this what their research which focused on a mere 5 companies is really about? ltr is fast becoming the most dishonest commenter here – and given the Usual Suspects, this is quite the accomplishment.
My favorite peer-reviewed and journal published papers from Hendrix are “Manic Depression” “Cross-town Traffic” and “Wind Cries Mary”. Those were in his early years of research at an age when researchers tend to have their biggest breakthroughs.
wind cries mary should be considered one of his premier research papers, in my opinion. but he also produced a great peer review article called little wing. although his protege srv improved on the original article, to much applause.
“The Wind Cries Mary” is indeed a stellar research effort, and I most enthusiastically endorse baffling’s citation of “Little Wing,” my personal favorite of all of Hendrix’s oeuvre. I will believe until my dying day that he could have investigated the topic more comprehensively, in more depth, thereby significantly strengthening his results, as impressive as they are. Even the re-examination, though not a replication, of the subject by Derek and the Dominos serves to emphasize the quality of the original work. BTW, I’m also a fan of his “Castles Made of Sand,” a lesser known and, admittedly, lesser work. Nevertheless, I am very fond of it.
castles was simply published prematurely. the potential was there. but the publish or perish lifestyle of a researcher produced an unfinished product. but i liked it. while hendrix was famous for the bombastic feedback of some higher octane work, he showed real genius in some of his ballads as well. life cut short.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-05/21/c_139959978.htm
May 21, 2021
Tibet Since 1951: Liberation, Development and Prosperity
From State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China
Contents
Foreword
I. Tibet Before the Peaceful Liberation
II. Peaceful Liberation
III. Historic Changes in Society
IV. Rapid Development of Various Undertakings
V. A Complete Victory over Poverty
VI. Protection and Development of Traditional Culture
VII. Remarkable Results in Ethnic and Religious Work
VIII. Solid Environmental Safety Barriers
IX. Resolutely Safeguarding National Unity and Social Stability
X. Embarking on a New Journey in the New Era
Conclusion
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-06/18/c_1310014464.htm
June 18, 2021
Former serf enjoys happy life in Tibet
Sonam, 86, a resident of Xaga Village, started to do hard labor when he was 13 at a local manor, where, apart from babysitting the manor owner’s children, he had to graze animals during the day and keep them fed over the night. He himself, however, did not have adequate food and clothing, and was forced to sleep with the animals at the sheepfold. “I had been verbally and physically abused so often that I simply went numb,” Sonam recalled. Sonam was allocated with farmland, housing and livestock after the democratic reform in 1959. “I’m already a great grandfather now, enjoying a happy life with all my offspring,” Sonam said. His first son, 62, is a member of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and a business leader at his village. They managed to refurbish their residence in 2013. Sonam said his life today was beyond “the wildest imagination” in his early years.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-06/26/c_1310029167.htm
June 26, 2021
Why Western political theories can’t explain success of century-old CPC
By Gui Tao, Jiang Jiang, Wang Zichen and Li Zhihui
BEIJING — At an altitude of 3,300 meters, Sonam Tsering offered a hada, a traditional Tibetan silk scarf that symbolizes purity and auspiciousness, to a guest who had come from afar — Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee.
The Tibetan herdsman, whose family previously struggled to make ends meet in a mountainous rural village in northwest China’s Qinghai Province, now owns 80 sheep and 20 cattle thanks to poverty-alleviation subsidies and loans from the government.
Sonam Tsering, who had bid farewell to his former home, a dilapidated adobe structure surrounded by uneven stone walls, welcomed Xi outside his new house that is equipped with a flush toilet and a driveway that leads up to the front door.
“Thanks to the Party’s favorable policies, the lives of us herders are getting better every day,” Sonam Tsering said….
ROFLMAO.
ltr, have you considered entering an Open Mic night? You should, because you’ve instigated belly laughs from me every time I’ve revisited this thread.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2021-06/12/c_1310004703.htm
June 12, 2021
Image Archives of Former Serfs in Tibet: Namgyel Dorje
Namgyel Dorje, 83, led an arduous life before the democratic reform in Tibet. He started to work at a serf owner’s manor since his early childhood, constantly beaten even for slight tardiness. Bare-footed all year long, Namgyel Dorje had no extra cloth but the piece he was already in, and he had to trade an entire day of hard labor for a handful of zanba (a traditional rice cake) cooked with literally no oil in it. Along with tens of thousands of other serfs, Namgyel Dorje embarked on a new life of dignity after the democratic reform in Tibet in 1959. He was finally freed and received farm land and animals from the local government. “Today, I can eat and wear whatever I like, along with pension from the government,” said Namgyel Dorje, “and I would expect nothing more.”
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-29/The-Imperialism-of-human-rights-and-the-human-rights-of-imperialism-11tSs1nktBC/index.html
June 29, 2021
The Imperialism of human rights and the human rights of imperialism
By Radhika Desai
At the 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), but actually before the court of Western opinion that increasingly resembles a kangaroo court, Canada repeated allegations that Chinese authorities are conducting genocide of the Muslims in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Without evidence, it claimed to be speaking for some 44 Western countries, their allies and clients (though Ukraine later withdrew) against the opposition of 65 countries.
These allegations are part of the West’s imperialism of human rights – the imposition of economic and political subordination on Third World countries in the name of promoting human rights there. Western countries have long justified their imperialism – of direct colonialism or indirect influence on the ruling and political classes of Third World countries – through hypocritical discourses.
During the 19th century, they were openly racist, speaking of the “White Men’s Burden” and his mission to civilize the rest of the world. In the mid-20th century, amid decolonization, racism was unaffordable and the favored discourse was of development. In the post-Cold War period, it has been democracy and human rights.
However, as the West’s imperial power wanes, it becomes more and more difficult to square this imperialism of human rights with the actual human rights of imperialism. Far from being exemplars of human rights, the imperialist Western countries have been the principal violators of human rights in the world.
Just consider Canada. Even as the Canadian parliament voted unanimously that China was committing genocide in Xinjiang and its representative at the UNHRC was repeating these false allegations, the centuries-long struggle of Indigenous peoples displaced by Canada for their land, their rights and their sovereignty entered a new phase.
In late May, the Tk’emlups te Secwépemc people announced that they had discovered unmarked graves of 215 children on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School run by the Catholic Church and funded by the Federal government.
For decades, indigenous children, separated from their families at tender ages, suffered physical and sexual abuse, malnutrition (often deliberate as part of experiments) and a systematic program to de-culture them, to “take the Indian out of the child.”
The 2015 Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), made possible by centuries of struggle against the Canadian settler state, concluded that what went on in these schools amounted to “cultural genocide.” With the discovery of the unmarked graves, people realize the first word was always redundant.
Most other indigenous nations are now combing residential school grounds in their area with ground-penetrating radar. 751 more unmarked graves were discovered at the Cowessess First Nation in southeast Saskatchewan on June 27. Without doubt there will be many more.
Solar lights and flags now mark the spots where 751 human remains were recently discovered in unmarked graves at the site of the former Marieval Indian Residential School on the Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan, June 27, 2021. /Getty
Scared and secular authorities are now passing responsibility back and forth, as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says “sorry” and demands that Pope Francis do the same and the Catholic Church responds that it had run these institutions at the behest of the Canadian state.
To those pointing to the hypocrisy of the allegations of an unproven genocide in China when a new and macabre dimension of the actual genocide at home is being uncovered, Trudeau says at least Canada acknowledges its genocide.
Does it? The TRC focused only on residential schools, leaving out the multitude of other wrongs of centuries of settler colonialism. We can enumerate land dispossession, treaty violations, the seizure of children by state bureaucracies, routine racism from the public, government officials, police and health providers, inadequate food, housing and schooling, boiled water advisories, social dislocation and distress, disproportionate incarceration of indigenous people, hundreds of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.
However, that a very far from complete list. Moreover, the TRC was not authorized to conclude genocide and implicate the Canadian government legally, hence its lesser conclusion of “cultural genocide”.
Moreover, in keeping with the political style of Western capitalist countries, these violated human rights of imperialism will be at best acknowledged symbolically and then too partially and definitely not redressed materially.
After all, the chief function of capitalist states like Canada is to project the power of their capitalist classes and protect their property rights. Most ordinary citizens have to struggle long and hard to be heard at all, then only faintly and distortedly.
Moreover, the property rights the Canadian state protects most tenderly are those of their extractivist capitalist classes based on mining and agriculture over land, precisely that which is at the heart of the violation of indigenous people’s rights. Canada will have to cease to be the extractivist, settler-colonial capitalist state it is before the genocide of indigenous people and peoples can end and their land, sovereignty and rights restored.
Meanwhile, the violated human rights of imperialism in the rest of the world must await discussion another time.
Radhika Desai is a professor of political studies at the University of Manitoba in Canada.
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/trump-war-on-huawei-meng-wanzhou-arrest-by-jeffrey-d-sachs-2018-12
December 11, 2018
The War on Huawei
The Trump administration’s conflict with China has little to do with US external imbalances, closed Chinese markets, or even China’s alleged theft of intellectual property. It has everything to do with containing China by limiting its access to foreign markets, advanced technologies, global banking services, and perhaps even US universities.
By Jeffrey Sachs
https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/26/opinions/china-is-not-the-enemy-sachs/index.html
May 26, 2019
China is not the source of our economic problems — corporate greed is
By Jeffrey Sachs
China is not an enemy. It is a nation trying to raise its living standards through education, international trade, infrastructure investment, and improved technologies. In short, it is doing what any country should do when confronted with the historical reality of being poor and far behind more powerful countries. Yet the Trump administration is now aiming to stop China’s development, which could prove to be disastrous for both the United States and the entire world.
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/cheney-doctrine-us-war-on-chinese-technology-by-jeffrey-d-sachs
November 7, 2019
America’s war on Chinese technology
In the run up to the Iraq War, then-US Vice President Richard Cheney declared that even if the risk of weapons of mass destruction falling into terrorist hands was tiny, say 1%, we should act as if it were certain by invading. The US is at it again, creating a panic over Chinese technologies by exaggerating tiny risks.
By Jeffrey Sachs
https://www.cirsd.org/en/horizons/horizons-winter-2019-issue-no-13/will-america-create-a-cold-war-with-china
January, 2019
Will America Create a Cold War With China?
By Jeffrey Sachs
https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/apfjc5yg352d554k2ar2wwwkk8ryw9
May 10, 2021
Xinjiang genocide allegations are unjustified
By Jeffrey Sachs and William Schabas
“The genocide charge was made on the final day of Donald Trump’s administration by then-Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, who made no secret of his belief in lying as a tool of US foreign policy.”
You are now guilty of blatant misdirection. Menzie is not Mike Pompeo and he is not accusing the PRC of genocide. His posts on this are about working abuse but not genocide. Can you please stop this intellectual garbage?
https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/apfjc5yg352d554k2ar2wwwkk8ryw9
May 10, 2021
Xinjiang genocide allegations are unjustified
By Jeffrey Sachs and William Schabas
The US government has needlessly escalated its rhetoric against China by claiming that a genocide is being mounted against the Uighur people in the Xinjiang region.
Such a grave charge matters, as genocide is rightly considered “the crime of crimes”. Many pundits are now calling for a boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, dubbing them the “Genocide Olympics”.
The genocide charge was made on the final day of Donald Trump’s administration by then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who made no secret of his belief in lying as a tool of US foreign policy. Now President Joe Biden’s administration has doubled down on Pompeo’s flimsy claim, even though the State Department’s own top lawyers reportedly share our scepticism regarding the charge….
https://english.jnu.edu.cn/2021/0423/c2027a612937/page.htm
March 31, 2021
2 Jinan University Researchers Publish Report on Xinjiang Minority Workers
By Xiong Chaoran
Nilufer Gheyret and Ning Chen, JNU researchers from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, spent nine months completing a detailed, comprehensive research report on members of ethnic minorities from Xinjiang working in Guangdong. They investigated five companies in Guangdong that employ 474 ethnic-minority workers from Xinjiang and interviewed 70 workers, including Uygurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and Tajiks. Their research used focus group interviews, in-depth interviews, participatory observation and other methods to study the five companies, including the two mentioned in a report published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute that denigrates the Chinese government’s labor transfer policy as an extension of forced labor.”
During the investigation, the JNU researchers found that the migrants were working outside Xinjiang of their own accord and that their work had many positive effects, including boosting their income and broadening their horizons. They also found that the rights of ethnic minority workers from Xinjiang have been fully guaranteed.
In fact, the report said, labor transfer policy is one way to achieve excellent results in national poverty alleviation, and the Chinese government, together with the people of all ethnic groups in China, has won an all-around victory in the fight against poverty and created a miracle in history.
The research found these workers chose to work outside of Xinjiang for these reasons:
• 36% for higher income.
• 24% because of introductions by family and friends.
• 15% for the agreeable natural environment.
• 13% for better educational resources for their children.
• 8% to improve language and vocational skills.
• 5% to broaden their horizons.
According to the report, higher salaries are one important reason attracting the migrants to work outside Xinjiang. This research showed that the average annual income of these 474 workers from Xinjiang was about 55,110 yuan per person (based on 11 months of work in a year, with a one-month vacation to go home every year). Even the lowest-paid cook can earn 38,500 yuan a year.
According to The Statistical Communique on the National Economic and Social Development of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in 2019, residents’ per capita disposable income was 23,103 yuan, 34,664 for urban residents and 13,122 for rural residents.
The five companies studied all provide free dormitories for minority workers, generally two to four people per room. The dormitories are equipped with independent washrooms and bathrooms and common household appliances such as air conditioning and washing machines. For couples, the companies will provide free or cheap (100 yuan per month) couple’s rooms, and some workers choose to live off-campus (300 to 400 yuan per month).
Because the report comes during a boycott of Xinjiang cotton by brands such as BCI and H&M, it has been gaining more attention.
It made me so furious, and I couldn’t sleep well the whole night when I saw H&M and some brands like Nike make statements boycotting Xinjiang cotton, Gheyret said. I am also from Xinjiang, and my hometown is also a really important place for growing cotton. I think the Western media or the organizations who have this kind of thinking and accusations should come to Xinjiang and see the truth themselves.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202105/1223611.shtml
May 16, 2021
‘Forced labor’ lies won’t beat down Xinjiang solar firms
World needs region’s firms in green energy push
By Zhang Dan
In the city of Shihezi, a two-hour drive or some 150 kilometers northwest of Urumqi, regional capital of Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, a factory producing polysilicon demonstrated how Chinese firms, including those in the region, rose to dominance in the global solar industry: advanced and automated factories that produce high-quality and low-cost PV products the world needs.
During a recent trip to Xinjiang Daqo facility – one of the world’s largest high-purity polysilicon manufacturer, I saw humming production lines with robots and a small number of workers – in stark contrast to stereotypes and accusations of outdated production equipment and the use of “forced labor.”
Over the past decade, Xinjiang has become a major polysilicon production hub in China, as the industry requires extensive amounts of energy, and that makes relatively cheaper electricity and abundant thermal power in Xinjiang appealing.
But in recent months, groundless accusations claiming companies like Daqo use “forced labor” through government-backed “labor transfer schemes” have been making noise in some global media outlets.
However, after visiting the Daqo plant in Xinjiang twice and talking to workers freely in the past month, I found no signs of “forced labor” in the factory at all. Instead, a high level of employee satisfaction and high wages at the company made it a sought-after job in the city, workers and local residents in Shihezi told me.
Ignoring both the rebuttal by Daqo executives about the baseless claim of “labor transfer schemes” and the company’s open tour for media outlets and financial institutions from the West, some interest groups kept citing the cliché accusation of “forced labor” after a similar tactic on Xinjiang cotton seems have created a splash.
Following unsubstantiated charges by a US trade group and politicians, a report from the Helena Kennedy Centre for International Justice at Sheffield Hallam University in England on Friday alleged that all four polysilicon manufacturers in Xinjiang – Daqo, GCL-Poly, Xinte Energy and East Hope Group – have reported their participation in labor transfer or labor placement programs….
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1225996.shtml
June 11, 2021
Mechanization rate in Xinjiang farms beyond imagination, as cotton pickers vie for work: field study report
By Liu Xin and Fan Lingzhi
The mechanization of cotton picking in Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region is beyond the imagination of the outside world, and as picking cotton can earn more than working in factories, many people are competing for these jobs, said a latest report released by a university-affiliated think tank, noting that if Western scholars carried out field surveys, they would not reach the “absurd” conclusion that there was “forced labor.”
Due to the inflammatory hyping of some Western media on the use of “mass forced labor” in Xinjiang’s cotton-related industries, since 2019, the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI), a nongovernmental organization that aims to promote better standards in cotton farming, announced it was suspending offering licenses to companies in the Xinjiang region, and some fashion and sports outlets including H&M and NIKE also stated they would refuse to buy cotton from China’s Xinjiang.
Considering the public attention on Xinjiang cotton, the National Human Rights Education and Training Base and the Non-traditional Security Institute of Southwest University of Political Science and Law decided to conduct a field survey. The team spent two weeks visiting cotton farmers, cotton pickers, agents, yarning companies and officials from local governments in Aksu, Kashi and Hotan prefectures to obtain information on cotton planting and mechanization, Shang Haiming, a professor from the National Human Rights Education and Training Base, told the Global Times.
The resulting 10,000-word report has four parts – Mechanization of cotton production has become common in southern Xinjiang; reasons and analysis behind the increase of mechanization rate; situation of cotton hand pickers in southern Xinjiang; and conclusion. It showed that in recent years, with the aim of increasing production rates and reducing costs, cotton farmers in southern Xinjiang have introduced new technologies and bought new machines to realize better planting, fertilizing and picking. The popular use of machines in cotton planting and harvesting has become a trend.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/Portals/0/attachment/2021/2021-06-11/d793b2a3-1f0d-4746-9f28-dcb991743802.jpeg ….
ltr,
The mechanization rate for cotton production in Ximjiang is “beyond imagination”? And just how does this disprove allegations of forced labor there?
BTW, since you are so into celebrating the centennial of the CCP, would you like to tell us a single thing where PRC has outperformed Taiwan economically, politically, or socially? Oh, I grant some things they are able to do because of their great size such as put a rover on Mars and fund a massive Belt and Road initiative. But those are the only sorts of things you will be able to come up with.
The mechanization rate for cotton production was a big deal in the old South. I guess ltr would say that excuses slavery.
Confederates would love how you just excused slavery in the Old South.
“it was suspending offering licenses to companies in the Xinjiang region, and some fashion and sports outlets including H&M and NIKE also stated they would refuse to buy cotton from China’s Xinjiang.”
Gee those running shorts I bought for $20 will not cost me $25. Your little defense of slavery is not exactly impressing anyone.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-29/The-Imperialism-of-human-rights-and-the-human-rights-of-imperialism-11tSs1nktBC/index.html
June 29, 2021
The Imperialism of human rights and the human rights of imperialism
By Radhika Desai
At the 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), but actually before the court of Western opinion that increasingly resembles a kangaroo court, Canada repeated allegations that Chinese authorities are conducting genocide of the Muslims in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Without evidence, it claimed to be speaking for some 44 Western countries, their allies and clients (though Ukraine later withdrew) against the opposition of 65 countries.
These allegations are part of the West’s imperialism of human rights – the imposition of economic and political subordination on Third World countries in the name of promoting human rights there. Western countries have long justified their imperialism – of direct colonialism or indirect influence on the ruling and political classes of Third World countries – through hypocritical discourses.
During the 19th century, they were openly racist, speaking of the “White Men’s Burden” and his mission to civilize the rest of the world. In the mid-20th century, amid decolonization, racism was unaffordable and the favored discourse was of development. In the post-Cold War period, it has been democracy and human rights.
However, as the West’s imperial power wanes, it becomes more and more difficult to square this imperialism of human rights with the actual human rights of imperialism. Far from being exemplars of human rights, the imperialist Western countries have been the principal violators of human rights in the world.
Just consider Canada. Even as the Canadian parliament voted unanimously that China was committing genocide in Xinjiang and its representative at the UNHRC was repeating these false allegations, the centuries-long struggle of Indigenous peoples displaced by Canada for their land, their rights and their sovereignty entered a new phase.
In late May, the Tk’emlups te Secwépemc people announced that they had discovered unmarked graves of 215 children on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School run by the Catholic Church and funded by the Federal government.
For decades, indigenous children, separated from their families at tender ages, suffered physical and sexual abuse, malnutrition (often deliberate as part of experiments) and a systematic program to de-culture them, to “take the Indian out of the child.”
The 2015 Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), made possible by centuries of struggle against the Canadian settler state, concluded that what went on in these schools amounted to “cultural genocide.” With the discovery of the unmarked graves, people realize the first word was always redundant.
Most other indigenous nations are now combing residential school grounds in their area with ground-penetrating radar. 751 more unmarked graves were discovered at the Cowessess First Nation in southeast Saskatchewan on June 27. Without doubt there will be many more.
Solar lights and flags now mark the spots where 751 human remains were recently discovered in unmarked graves at the site of the former Marieval Indian Residential School on the Cowessess First Nation in Saskatchewan, June 27, 2021. /Getty
Scared and secular authorities are now passing responsibility back and forth, as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says “sorry” and demands that Pope Francis do the same and the Catholic Church responds that it had run these institutions at the behest of the Canadian state.
To those pointing to the hypocrisy of the allegations of an unproven genocide in China when a new and macabre dimension of the actual genocide at home is being uncovered, Trudeau says at least Canada acknowledges its genocide.
Does it? The TRC focused only on residential schools, leaving out the multitude of other wrongs of centuries of settler colonialism. We can enumerate land dispossession, treaty violations, the seizure of children by state bureaucracies, routine racism from the public, government officials, police and health providers, inadequate food, housing and schooling, boiled water advisories, social dislocation and distress, disproportionate incarceration of indigenous people, hundreds of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.
However, that a very far from complete list….
Radhika Desai is a professor of political studies at the University of Manitoba in Canada.
ltr, i noticed you never commented on the massacre of students in tiananmen square. do you deny it even occurred?
Xinjiang by the way has a remarkably varied and exciting landscape that attracts literally tens of millions of visitors yearly, and the recorded visits are repeatedly rewarding. Then too the reaches of Xinjiang have been made increasingly accessible through infrastructure development, and the infrastructure development has made Xinjiang an important road along the Belt and Road. The province as well as offering fertile land, which is already largely and increasingly farmed with advanced technology, is highly energy rich. New proven oil reservoirs are Texas or Alaska sized.
Interestingly, diplomats from country after country have visited Xinjiang these last years and are pleased with and impressed by what they have found. This includes many diplomats from predominantly Muslim countries. Then again Kazakhstan is a large neighboring predominantly Muslim country and there is an agreeable flow of people from Xinjiang to Kazakhstan.
i noticed those visits do not include the detention camps, where genocide is occurring. and are we still not permitted to discuss the tiananmen square massacre in china? last i heard, you were thrown in jail if you commented on the massacre of unarmed citizens in china.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-26/China-is-paying-hypocritical-Western-nations-back-in-their-own-coin-11pbkcmfLyw/index.html
June 26, 2021
China is paying hypocritical Western nations back in their own coin
By Maitreya Bhakal
For decades, some Western nations have bullied and lectured non-West nations. Some countries are pushing back. China in particular, one of the quietest and most restrained nations on Earth (especially compared to Western countries), has had enough.
Ever since China proved to be a rising threat to U.S. global supremacy, the West has unleashed a massive propaganda and diplomatic campaign against it. A key aspect of the strategy is hypocrisy: Goebbels’ technique to accuse your enemies of what you yourself are guilty of.
Real and imagined genocides
Genocide is the most egregious example, and Canada was seen by many as one of the most egregious offenders. Canada forced more than 150,000 indigenous children to attend residential schools from the 1870s to the 1990s. The objective was to wipe out indigenous culture, which was described by officials at the time as the “Indian problem.”
Few Canadians are aware of why indigenous peoples are called “Indians,” and that Columbus was actually looking for India when he stumbled upon the American continent, and that its original inhabitants came to be called “Indians” as a result. In fact, just like Columbus, few Canadians today can even point to India on a map.
The objective was to assimilate indigenous children into white Canadian society. They were forcibly separated from their parents, beaten for speaking their own language, and prevented from following their culture. Many were tortured and physically and sexually abused.
Thus, naturally, these are the same crimes Western media accuse China of committing. There are few better examples of psychological projection (and psychopathy) than committing such abuses yourself, and then falsely accusing someone else of committing them. The more atrocities China can be accused of committing – the less guilty they feel about having actually committed theirs.
Moreover, it takes away attention from your own real crimes and shifts the focus on China’s imaginary ones. The world can then spend more time discussing China’s unproven, imaginary genocide in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, and focus less on Canada’s real, proven genocide at home.
The evidence is so overwhelming, and Canada’s crimes so barbaric, that Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper even had to publicly apologize in 2008. No wonder Canada is keen to divert as much attention as it can.
Bodies of guilt
Hundreds of dead bodies of indigenous children have been discovered this year in unmarked graves in residential schools across Canada. The discovery ignited soul-searching across the nation, with many questioning the very morals and values of racism and white supremacy upon which it is built.
Normally, China would’ve kept quiet about this incident. After all, it was an internal – if savage – affair of Canada. Unlike some Western countries, it is generally not in the habit of lecturing other nations on their crimes – current or past.
Yet, everyone’s patience has its limits. Recently, at the 47th session of the UN Human Rights Council, Canada, along with a cabal of 43 other countries, ganged up on China unprovoked and accused it of mass human rights violations in Xinjiang. The letter talked of detention and “restrictions on fundamental freedoms and…culture”, and without any sense of irony, “forced separation of children from their parents.” Change the country from China to Canada and “Uygur” to “indigenous”, and it would sound exactly like what Canada did, word for word.
Enough is enough
China had had enough. It decided to hit back. First, Belarus released a counter-statement, signed by 65 countries, expressing firm opposition to any interference in China’s domestic issues. Once the ball of justice got rolling, more countries joined in and released separate statements, taking the total number of nations supporting China to a whopping 90.
It was a humiliating defeat for the proud white “democracies” of the West, who consider themselves the “international community.” They had not anticipated such overwhelming opposition.
China’s second tactic was to target Canada itself, the nation chosen to bell the cat. In a pre-emptive move, aware of the statement in advance, China responded (with multiple co-signatory nations) even before Canada’s statement was officially delivered. Jiang Duan, a senior Chinese official at the UN, called for a “thorough and impartial investigation” into Canada’s genocidal accusations. And unlike Canada’s statement, this call for an investigation was based on real crimes, not imaginary ones.
It was a revealing sight, and long overdue: China criticizing Canada for its actual human rights abuses in response to Canada’s endless criticism of China’s imaginary ones.
No longer biding its time ….
ltr,
Oh, this is more silliness.
The US has been guilty of wrongly killing people up until quite recently, heck, with drones still at work arguably still going on. The US also had slavery and horrible policies towards Mexicans, and so on. So, fine if you want to charge the US with hypocrisy in criticizing human rights policies in PRC, you have grounds for doing so.
But Canada? Sorry, this is a pathetic joke. Yes, Canada had bad policies towards Native Americans, although their policies on that were generally better than those of the US. The recent shocking news has been this discovery of these childrens’ graves at some of these schools. But when do those date from? Quite a long time ago.
As it is, Canada has been probably the leading nation, or one of them, willing to provide troops for peacekeeing to the UN. It is about as goody goody as they come,, PRC does not remotely compared, no democracy at all ever, although Taiwan has managed to achieve it.
So the serious issue right now is the treatment of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang right now, not decades ago. That Canada a long time ago mistreated Native children does not remotely offer a response to Canada leading nations criticizing PRC policy in Ximjiang. Pathetic.
Pakistan has a population of about 225 million, Egypt has a population of some 104 million. Both countries are predominantly Muslim and yet the 2 countries are close supporters of China. Both countries, along with 88 others, just supported China at UN Human Rights Council meetings.
Really, please stop. My sides hurt SO much. I had no idea that you could be so hilarious.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-26/China-thanks-Egypt-for-support-at-UN-Human-Rights-Council-11oN58Wbo7C/index.html
June 26, 2021
China thanks Egypt for support at UN Human Rights Council
Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Friday that China and Egypt have always supported each other firmly on issues concerning each other’s core interests, and China appreciates Egypt’s participation in a joint statement supporting Beijing at the 47th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council.
Wang made the remarks during a phone conversation with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry over bilateral ties and cooperation in vaccine production.
Facing the COVID-19 pandemic, China has always given priority to Egypt’s needs and tried its best to provide vaccine support to Egypt, Wang said.
A production line in Egypt of China’s Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine will begin operation soon, Wang noted. It is the first time that China works with an African country in vaccine production, and the minister said that he hoped the project would proceed smoothly.
The Chinese side thanks Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi for his recent recorded video to extend congratulations on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC), Wang said.
For his part, Shoukry, on behalf of the Egyptian government and people, once again extended warm congratulations on the anniversary.
Egypt-China relations boast a long history and the two sides share broad common interests, Shoukry said, adding that the two countries have offered firm support to each other on various major issues in a vivid demonstration of their strong ties….
I remember reading about the construction of Boulder (Hoover) Dam during the Depression and what the project meant in the West at that particular time and beyond. Well, the Chinese are just completing such a dam in modern form and I realized anew that everywhere through China, through a country the size of the United States with Alaska, there are transformational projects. The point is continually bettering lives, continually adding to well-being through the vast country. After all, what does the end of severe poverty for the 1.4 billion Chinese signify?
Splendid.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1227437.shtml
June 29, 2021
Baihetan project leads the world in hydropower technology: engineers
By Lin Xiaoyi
Zhaotong – The Baihetan Hydropower Station in Southwest China, the world’s largest and most technically challenging hydropower project currently under construction, began operations on Monday while the Chinese people celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC).
The hydropower station stands on the Jinsha River, an upper stretch of the Yangtze River, at a cost of 220 billion yuan ($34.07 billion). It will be China’s second largest hydropower project after the Three Gorges Dam once it is completed.
Since the start of construction of the Baihetan Dam in 2017, the project had to overcome extremely difficult technical challenges, breaking a number of world records including the largest underground caverns, the largest anti-seismic parameters of a 300-meter high dam, and the largest spillway caverns.
Specialists noted that since the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, China’s hydropower industry has developed at a tremendous pace. China moved from being a “follower” to becoming a world leader in sustainable energy.
The start of operations of the Baihetan Hydropower Station marks a milestone in China’s hydropower projects, the largest-scale in the world. More importantly, it shows China’s development of the technology required in water resources management and hydropower engineering.
Mega hydropower station hidden in the mountain
The hydropower station, situated on the border of Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, will have a total installed capacity of 16 million kilowatts produced by 16 generating units with a capacity of 1 million kilowatts each, the largest single-unit capacity in the world.
Each of the generating units is more than 50 meters high with a weight of more than 8,000 tons, equivalent to the weight of a destroyer, and an efficiency of up to 99 percent.
“The commissioning of the first two generating units of the Baihetan Hydropower Station reflects the development of China’s hydroelectricity generating unit capacity, from 300,000 kilowatts to 700,000 kilowatts, and finally 1 million kilowatts, making it the ‘Qomolangma’ of the world’s hydroelectric industry,” He Wei, Deputy Director of the Baihetan Hydropower Station Engineering and Construction Department, told the Global Times.
He noted that in the past, China took the path of innovation based on inspiration from advances in science and technology from abroad to build the Three Gorges Dam. But in Baihetan project, despite being challenged by the technological isolation from some countries or the rising price of supplies, China achieved total independent innovation by its own merits.
In the face of allegations by some Western media claiming that the generators installed in the dam were “brutally copied”, Chen Jianlin, Chief Engineer of the Baihetan Hydropower Station, pointed out that some reporters have ulterior motives and lack a basic understanding of the hydropower industry.
“There is no standardized production model. Each hydropower station is unique because the geological conditions and hydrological environment of each station is totally different. The generating principle of different power units is also distinct,” Chen told the Global Times.
Chen noted that the development of a megawatt unit is far more difficult than any other project under construction or in operation in the world. “If there is plagiarism, it is other countries that are copying us,” he joked.
In order to accommodate the colossal 16 generating units, two super power stations, 438 meters long and 88.7 meters high, were built under the mountains on both sides of the dam, making them the largest underground power plants in the world.
The total length of the tunnels for power generation and flood control is about 217 kilometers, equivalent to the distance from East China’s Shanghai to Ningbo, and the underground chamber required an excavation of 25 million cubic meters, enough to build 10 Egyptian pyramids.
Building a dam in the narrow V-shaped valley of the Jinsha River has space limitations and is faced with extremely complex geological conditions. However, the construction of this “underground city” has only taken about four years to complete.
The world’s first ‘seamless dam’
The construction of the Baihetan Dam also required significant innovation in China’s hydropower engineering equipment and construction techniques.
In the underground chambers on the left bank of the Baihetan Dam, there are three spillway tunnels that have been described as engineering marvels and works of art.
Perhaps they could be called a miracle because each flood tunnel is more than 2,000 meters long, with an overflow area of more than 200,000 square meters. They can withstand a large discharge of more than 12,000 cubic meters per second and a high flow velocity of 47 meters per second, which can fill the entire West Lake (covering an area of 650 hectares, 3 meters deep on average), in just 18 minutes….
ltr: In general, it is not necessary to copy the entire article. Please just paste in the most relevant component, for the sake of blog readability.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202105/1223323.shtml
May 12, 2021
Xinjiang solar firm debunks ‘forced labor’ lies by hosting Western media, analysts
Factory shows off highly automated operation to Western visitors
By Zhang Dan
Shihezi, Xinjiang – Xinjiang Daqo, a high-purity polysilicon manufacturer in Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, sought to debunk accusations of using “forced labor”, as it opened its doors to solar industry analysts from top financial institutions and journalists from English-language media.
By showing off its production lines equipped with advanced robots and a small number of workers, the company proved to the guests that its highly automated operations are not labor-intensive and that “forced labor” claims fabricated by some Western anti-China forces are groundless.
On Tuesday, the company, one of the four major polysilicon producers, hosted a group of 27 visitors including analysts from Goldman Sachs, HSBC, JP Morgan, Credit Suisse, Temasek, CICC and so on, as well as journalists from the Global Times, Bloomberg and the Financial Times.
During the visit, several solar-sector analysts from these financial institutions told the Global Times that so-called forced labor does not exist in the polysilicon factories in Xinjiang, because the industry is not labor-intensive.
“I visited the plant of GCL-Poly Energy in Xinjiang two years ago. Their production lines are similar to those of Xinjiang Daqo, which are both highly automated,” an analyst from one of the world-renowned financial institutions, told the Global Times during her visit on Tuesday.
The high-level automation was on vivid display inside the factory. At the chemical vapor deposition workshop, a mechanical arm unloaded polysilicon rods from the heating furnace. Workers only played a helping role as human contact may contaminate the rods.
In the smashing workshop where rods are broken into chunks, which used to employ the largest number of workers – around 100 per shift during 2016-17 – the Global Times reporter only counted six workers.
At the end of the tour, one of the foreign journalists said that “a small number of people work there.”
“What shocked the visitors, according to my observation, was the high level of automation. They basically accepted that it is impossible for there to be any type of ‘forced labor’ at our company, which is the fact that we wanted to show them,” the chief financial officer of Xinjiang Daqo, Yang Ming, told the Global Times on Tuesday….
During the 1930s and 1940s, during the Holocaust, China was a refuge for European Jews. To get to China meant to live, to be protected. The Chinese have a museum in Shanghai to memorialize the Jews sheltered from the Holocaust. There is a statue honoring a Jewish refugee which stands before a hospital established by the refugee. That refugee is honored by Chinese diplomats in Israel each year. Even now, Chinese diplomats each year observe the day of Holocaust remembrance and the day is recorded by Chinese media.
Then too the Chinese suffered terribly, during the Japanese invasion and marauding merciless occupation. This too is memorialized, and the Chinese understand the tragic significance. The Chinese understand the Holocaust and Nanjing.
No matter the accusations, they are false.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-30/China-certified-as-malaria-free-by-WHO-11w2pzTdrI4/index.html
June 30, 2021
China certified as malaria-free by WHO
By Gauden Galea
Malaria, a completely preventable and treatable disease, is also deadly. In 2019, it was the cause of 409,000 lives lost.
For decades, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the global community have worked to support national government efforts to eliminate this disease.
China is one such country. Malaria was once widespread, with over 24 million cases reported in the early 1970s. Building on earlier efforts that began as early as the 1950s, in 2010 the National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP) was launched, backed by strong political commitment and an effectively integrated approach across 13 ministries and between central and local levels.
The results were striking. Since 2017, China has reported zero indigenous malaria cases.
The end goal for all malaria-endemic countries is certification of malaria elimination, the official recognition by WHO of a country’s malaria-free status. WHO grants the certification when a country has proven that the chain of indigenous malaria transmission has been interrupted nationwide for at least the past 3 consecutive years. A country must also demonstrate the capacity to prevent the re-establishment of transmission.
Following a field visit this spring by an independent certification panel on June 30, 2021, WHO certified China as malaria-free.
Successful national malaria prevention and control plans require high levels of political commitment, translated into sufficient domestic funding and interventions often sustained over many decades, even after a country is malaria-free.
Most countries that reach zero malaria also have strong primary health care systems that ensure access to malaria prevention, diagnosis and treatment services, without financial hardship, for everyone living within their borders, regardless of nationality or legal status. Robust data systems are also a key to success, together with strong community engagement and improved hygiene.
This has been the experience in China. Take Yunnan Province as an example….
After more than 30 years at the politics/economics/business/China coal face, I will say that I have never seen Beijing respond to external pressure the way those advocating such pressure would prefer.
Any senior leader who appears to be caving in to foreign pressure is highly vulnerable to being undermined – or worse – by his colleagues (and, there are just about no females at the top ranks).