Report documents extensive grassroots policing of Uyghurs in Xinjiang

Scores of Chinese government bodies are engaged in an elaborate whole-of-government campaign of repression targeting Muslim Uyghurs in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region, according to report published this week by an Australian think tank. The report by the independent, nonpartisan Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) details the deep involvement of Chinese government agencies in a systematic effort to suppress the Uyghurs and their culture that has drawn accusations of genocide in several Western capitals.

The report titled “The Architecture of Repression: Unpacking Xinjiang’s Governance” is the latest document presenting evidence of the ramping up since 2014 of systematic human rights abuses of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).

The authors of the 80-page report reviewed thousands of Chinese-language sources, including leaked police records and government budget documents never before published, to map and analyze the mechanisms used by the Chinese government in the XUAR from 2014 to 2021, a period of mounting repression.

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