By Kaja Ippel
In 2019, the birth rate in Xinjiang dropped by 24 percent, while the worldwide birth rate had dropped by merely 4,2 percent that same year.[1] This shocking figure is a result of the cruel and inhumane campaign against Uyghur women by the Chinese government. Millions are poured into this campaign, which includes pregnancy checks, IUD placements, sterilizations, or even abortions.[2]
The draconian measures are enforced by fear, threats, and brutal sanctions in case of non-compliance. Official government documents state that violating the birth control measures is to be punished with extrajudicial internment.[3] As a result, parents are deported to detention camps for having too many children while the police sweep houses in search of children.[4]
Moreover, by 2019 Xinjiang had been planning to expose more than 80 percent of women in “the rural southern four minority prefectures”[5] to measures of birth control. These measures included IUD placements and quarterly checks. As if this was not enough, in 2019 and 2020 the Xinjiang Health Commission pumped millions into free ‘birth control surgeries’ aiming to cut down population growth. As mentioned before, this campaign included abortion and sterilizations and reports have shown that sterilizations have surged since 2017 and 2018.[6]
The foregoing measures clearly display an attempt to suppress the growth of the Uyghur population, contrasted by the promotion of the Han population in the Xinjiang region.[7] Hence, the campaign has thus been referred to as a “demographic genocide” by experts.[8] As young liberals, it is our duty to raise awareness of this draconian campaign and call it out for what it really is: genocide.
[1] https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/03/12/uyghur-women-are-chinas-victims-and-resistance/
[2] https://apnews.com/article/ap-top-news-international-news-weekend-reads-china-health-269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c
[3] https://jamestown.org/program/sterilizations-iuds-and-mandatory-birth-control-the-ccps-campaign-to-suppress-uyghur-birth-rates-in-xinjiang/
[4] https://apnews.com/article/ap-top-news-international-news-weekend-reads-china-health-269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c
[5] https://jamestown.org/program/sterilizations-iuds-and-mandatory-birth-control-the-ccps-campaign-to-suppress-uyghur-birth-rates-in-xinjiang/
[6] For more statistics I would like to refer to the report by Adrian Zenz “Sterilizations, IUDs, and Coercive Birth Prevention: The CCP’s Campaign to Suppress Uyghur Birth Rates in Xinjiang”.
[7] https://jamestown.org/program/sterilizations-iuds-and-mandatory-birth-control-the-ccps-campaign-to-suppress-uyghur-birth-rates-in-xinjiang/
[8] https://apnews.com/article/ap-top-news-international-news-weekend-reads-china-health-269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c