• U.S., China agree to forge new economic, financial dialogues
• Taiwan says Chinese movements “abnormal“, flags amphibious drills
• Trial of two Chinese activists held since 2021 begins in secret in Guangzhou
• Mosquitoes, a disinformation campaign by China and other news literacy lessons
• China fuels global surge in mpox cases as LGBTQ+ stigma hampers response
• China sentences Uyghur academic to life in prison in Xinjiang
• [World] Do China's recent military purges spell trouble for Xi Jinping?

U.S., China agree to forge new economic, financial dialogues

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/09/22/china-us-economic-dialogue/2023-09-22T13:06:47.891Z

The U.S. Treasury Department announced Friday it had formally established two new working groups to discuss China-U.S. economic and financial issues, a tentative sign that communication is improving between the two countries following a trip to Beijing by Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen this summer.

The new format for regular talks follows years of roiling economic conflict between Beijing and Washington over sanctions, trade restrictions and the treatment of Chinese and U.S. companies abroad after economic dialogues broke down during the Trump administration.

The working groups will hold regular direct meetings for “frank and substantive discussions on economic and financial policy matters,” the Treasury statement said. It added the dialogues would also include and “exchange of information on macroeconomic and financial developments.”

The high-level meetings will be led by Yellen on the U.S. side while China’s economic czar, Vice Premier He Lifeng, will oversee the work led by different agencies in Beijing. U.S. Treasury officials will hold dialogues for the economic working group with Beijing’s Finance Ministry, while the financial talks will take place with representatives from China’s Central Bank.

The new dialogues are part of broader efforts by the White House to reestablish communication channels between Washington and Beijing on a range of geopolitical, security and economic matters following talks between President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Bali last year. Those efforts have been hampered by hot-button issues, including the discovery of a Chinese spy balloon over the continental United States in February and rolling U.S. trade restrictions aimed at limiting Beijing’s access to U.S. technology.

China speaks of ‘rainbows’ during Yellen visit, but girds for trade battle

Nonetheless, the two sides have made strides this year. After abruptly canceling a visit over the spy balloon furor, Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled to Beijing in June. Yellen’s visit in July was followed by Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in August, where she announced that the two sides had agreed to hold an official ongoing dialogue on commercial issues, beginning in early 2024, drawing in individuals from the private sector with the aim of resolving issues over U.S. commercial access to the Chinese market.

The new dialogues agreed to by Yellen and He appear to have a broader remit, but it is unclear how often the meetings will take place. In Friday’s statement, the Treasury Department said they would happen at a “regular cadence.” Chinese official media released a brief statement confirming the establishment of the working groups that was sparse on detail, but said the group plans to hold “regular and irregular” meetings.

“These Working Groups will serve as important forums to communicate America’s interests and concerns, promote a healthy economic competition between our two countries with a level playing field for American workers and businesses, and advance cooperation on global challenges,” said Yellen in a statement posted on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, on Friday following the Treasury Department announcement.

Regular high-level economic dialogues between Treasury officials and Beijing were mostly dismantled in 2017, when the Trump administration began implementing sweeping tariffs, trade restrictions and sanctions against Beijing — many of which have remained in place or been extended under the current administration.

Before Yellen’s visit in July, no U.S. treasury secretary had visited Beijing since 2019, when then-Secretary Steven Mnuchin and a team of negotiators conducted limited talks following a total breakdown in discussions months before.

As China’s economy slows, the buck stops with leader Xi Jinping

While the new working groups signal a thawing in the economic relationship, communication between the two sides remains fragile. Beijing routinely expresses skepticism of U.S. commitments and has accused officials in Washington of failing to follow through on high-level discussions. Officials in Beijing maintain that the United States has arbitrarily broadened trade and economic restrictions to contain China’s economic growth under the guise of national and economic security.

Most recently, Beijing accused the United States of ongoing economic “bullying” after Biden in August signed an executive order to establish a screening mechanism for outbound investments and restrict U.S. investment in advanced Chinese technologies, including semiconductors.

“President Biden committed to not seeking to 'decouple’ from China or halt China’s economic development. We urge the U.S. to follow through on that commitment, stop politicizing, instrumentalizing and weaponizing tech and trade issues,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin following the August announcement.

Yellen and other U.S. officials have sought to push ahead with efforts to reopen channels of communication, while warning that the Biden administration will continue to take targeted actions to protect U.S. national security.

“It is vital that we talk, particularly when we disagree,” said Yellen in her statement on X on Friday.

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Taiwan says Chinese movements “abnormal“, flags amphibious drills

https://reuters.com/article/taiwan-china-defence/taiwan-says-chinese-movements-abnormal-flags-amphibious-drills-idUSKBN30S02A

Recent Chinese military movements around Taiwan were "abnormal", the island's defence minister said on Friday, flagging amphibious exercises in addition to drills Taipei has observed in the province facing the island.

Taiwan has reported an increase in such activity during the past week, as dozens of fighters, drones, bombers and other aircraft, as well as warships, have operated nearby.

China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, has in recent years carried out many such drills around the island, seeking to assert its sovereignty claims and pressure Taipei.

"Our initial analysis is that they are doing joint drills in September, including land, sea, air and amphibious," Defence Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng told reporters at parliament.

The "recent enemy situation is quite abnormal", he added.

The comments came after an unusual statement from the defence ministry on Thursday that it was keeping watch on Chinese activities near Dacheng Bay in the southern province of Fujian, facing Taiwan.

This is an area where Taiwan security sources say China performs landing drills.

China has not said anything about the drills around Taiwan, and its defence ministry did not respond to two requests for comment.

Chiu said releasing the information about Dacheng Bay was in line with his ministry's principle of keeping the public informed.

China carried out landing drills in Dacheng Bay in September last year and the year before that, said Chieh Chung, a military researcher at Taiwan's National Policy Foundation think tank.

Those exercises featured civilian ships with equipment practising "dockless unloading", to simulate a situation in which they might need to land after port facilities are knocked out of action or destroyed, Chieh said.

However, China would be hard pressed to carry out a frontal, amphibious invasion of the island, given geographic difficulties, a senior U.S. defence official told Congress on Tuesday.

Last week China also dispatched more than 100 military ships for regional exercises in areas such as strategic waters in the South China Sea and off Taiwan's northeast coast, a regional security official told Reuters on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media.

China traditionally performs large-scale exercises from July to September, Taiwan's defence ministry has said.

Earlier on Friday, the ministry said it had detected 24 Chinese military aircraft entering Taiwan's air defence identification zone during the previous 24 hours, with at least 17 crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait, according to a map it published.

The median line used to serve as an unofficial barrier between the two sides until China's air force began regularly crossing it last year.

A second security source told Reuters, also on condition of anonymity, that China was most likely seeking to wear out Taiwan's much smaller military with constant missions so close to Taiwan, especially with longer flights along the median line than before.

"China is seeking to normalise these activities and push Taiwan into a corner," the source said, adding this risked miscalculation if Chinese ships or aircraft got too close and Taiwan opened fire.

Taiwan has frequently said that it would remain calm and not escalate the situation, but that it won't allow "repeated provocations" from China, whose forces have so far not entered Taiwan's territorial seas or airspace.

Trial of two Chinese activists held since 2021 begins in secret in Guangzhou

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/22/trial-of-two-chinese-activists-held-since-2021-begins-in-secret-in-guangzhou

The trial of two prominent activists detained since 2021 has begun in secret in the Chinese city of Guangzhou, in a case that has attracted widespread attention to Beijing’s repression of civil society.

Huang Xueqin, a feminist activist and journalist who covered China’s #MeToo movement, and Wang Jianbing, a labour rights activist, were detained in Guangzhou in September 2021, shortly before Huang was due to move to the UK to study at the University of Sussex. The pair were charged with “inciting subversion of state power” the following month. The charge normally carries a sentence of up to five years, although terms can be longer in cases deemed severe.

The roads around the courthouses appeared to be closed to public access, supporters said on Friday morning.

The pair have been held largely incommunicado. Advocates say they have been subjected to secret interrogations, torture and ill-treatment. In the weeks after their detention, Guangzhou police interrogated nearly 70 of their acquaintances, according to Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD), a US-based human rights NGO. Several of those people were later forced to leave Guangzhou.

In the year leading up to their arrest, Huang and Wang had organised weekly meetings at Wang’s apartment in Guangzhou for like-minded progressives, to discuss issues such as feminism, LGBTQ+ rights and labour issues, but also to watch films and play board games. A friend of the pair who regularly attended said: “They were trying to rebuild a network, to bring together every isolated individual.” Wang was a “tea addict” and he and Huang would prepare a spread of drinks and snacks for the casual meetings. “We never thought that this was dangerous, or even offensive to the government,” said the friend.

As well as China’s #MeToo movement, Huang covered the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong as a journalist. Reflecting on reporting on the 2019 protests, Huang wrote: “Of course I understand the risks of pursuing freedom, and right now I am paying the price of being away from my loved ones back home.” Huang was later detained in Guangzhou and prevented from taking up a place on a postgraduate programme at the University of Hong Kong.

After being released in January 2020, Huang gained a certain cachet among activists in Guangzhou, who sometimes saw imprisonment as a badge of honour, said Mako, a friend of Huang’s, who uses a pseudonym to protect her identity. Huang was “appalled” by that attitude. “She didn’t think that she was superior just because she has been detained. Somehow she became even more down to earth, even more humble,” said Mako, who also attended the weekly meetings.

In June 2021, the British Foreign Office awarded Huang a Chevening scholarship, through a scheme which supports “outstanding emerging leaders from all over the world”. Huang was due to start a master’s degree in at the University of Sussex that autumn.

A spokesperson for the university said: “The University of Sussex community remains deeply concerned about Sophia Huang Xueqin, her safety and her wellbeing.

“We have consistently raised her case in meetings with the UK government and in correspondence with the British embassy in China.”

A spokesperson for the Foreign Office said: “We have directly raised our concerns on this case with the Chinese authorities on several occasions. Nobody should be arrested and put on trial for exercising their fundamental rights. British diplomats will seek to attend the trial.”

Representatives of seven consulates including the US attempted to attend the trial on Friday, but were not allowed into the courthouse.

William Nee, a researcher at CHRD, said that the Chinese authorities were often “very reluctant” to let people such as Huang go abroad. “If they’re abroad they can speak freely, they can connect with others and pose a threat to the regime.”

On Tuesday, Huang and Wang saw each other for what is believed to be the first time since they were detained, at a pre-trial meeting.

The pair are being held in Guangzhou number one detention centre. The prison did not respond to calls from the Guardian. Guangzhou’s public security bureau could not be reached for comment.

Huang was previously reported to be in poor health, having lost a significant amount of weight, although her situation is thought to have improved more recently.

In April 2022, Huang fired the lawyer that her family had appointed to represent her. She signed a letter dismissing Wan Miaoyan, a Chengdu-based lawyer who has known her for several years. In other cases, the Chinese authorities have been known to force detained people to dismiss their chosen counsel. But Wan has since managed to be reappointed. She declined to be interviewed but told the Guardian: “As her lawyer, I will do my best as any lawyer could do.”

On Thursday, 32 civil society groups, including Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders, published a joint statement calling for the “immediate and unconditional” release of Huang and Wang.

Additional reporting by Tzu-Wei Liu

Mosquitoes, a disinformation campaign by China and other news literacy lessons

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/09/22/mosquitos-disinformation-campaign-china-newsliteracy/2023-09-21T16:21:51.456Z

Here’s the latest installment of a feature I’ve been running for several years: lessons from the nonprofit, nonpartisan News Literacy Project (NLP) that aim to teach students and the public how to sort fact from fiction in our digital — and contentious — age. With the spread of rumors, baseless accusations and disinformation on social and partisan media sites, there has not been a time in recent U.S. history when this skill has been as important as it is now.

The material in this post comes from the Sift, the organization’s newsletter for educators, which has more than 10,000 readers. Published weekly during the school year, it explores timely examples of misinformation, addresses media and press freedom topics, looks at social media trends and issues, and includes discussion prompts and activities for the classroom.

Get Smart About News, modeled on the Sift, is a free weekly newsletter for the public. NLP has a free e-learning platform, Checkology, that helps educators teach middle and high school students how to identify credible information, seek reliable sources and know what to trust, what to dismiss and what to debunk. It also gives students an appreciation of the importance of the First Amendment and a free press.

Checkology and all of the NLP’s resources and programs are free. Since 2017, more than 475,000 students have used the platform. The organization has worked with more than 60,000 educators in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and more than 120 countries.

Here’s material from this week’s issue of the Sift:

Dig deeper: Don’t miss this week’s classroom-ready resource.

Top picks

It’s not always clear when social media influencers are being paid for their posts.

1. Dietitians are being paid to post videos on TikTok and Instagram promoting sugar, aspartame and dietary supplements, according to an analysis by the Examination and The Washington Post. The Canadian Sugar Institute and American Beverage, which represents PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, are among the trade and lobbying groups paying influencer registered dietitians to push products in posts that often include unproven claims and questionable messages about nutrition and healthy eating. While it’s not uncommon for social media influencers with large followings to partner with companies and brands to create paid content, the investigation found that many dietitians did not make clear their connections with the food and beverage industry.

• Discuss: How can you tell if content on social media is an ad or not? Why would lobbying groups pay influencers to encourage their followers to eat sugary foods, aspartame and dietary supplements? Why is it important for people to know when they’re encountering an advertisement? How can you verify whether health information online is accurate?

• Idea: As a class, watch one of the sponsored ad examples featured in the article and discuss the message it’s delivering: Who paid for it? Can you tell it’s an ad? Would you say the advertising has been responsibly and clearly labeled?

• Resources: “Branded Content” and “Be Health Informed” (NLP’s Checkology virtual classroom).

• Related: “A wellness coach claims she can fix people’s vision. An anti-misinformation TikToker isn’t having it.” (Emily Bloch, the Philadelphia Inquirer).

Dig Deeper: Use this think sheet to better understand paid partnerships with social media influencers.

2. A coordinated disinformation campaign by China spread bogus AI-generated content and disinformation online about the devastating wildfires in Hawaii last month, adopting themes and tactics from similar Russian operations. This approach, researchers say, represents a notable shift for Chinese disinformation campaigns, which have previously focused on supporting China’s own policies rather than stoking divisions in the United States. Researchers from several organizations, including Microsoft, NewsGuard and the RAND Corporation, identified the network of social media accounts China built and suggested it may be used for future influence operations — like the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

• Discuss: How can disinformation be used to sow discord in the United States and other countries? Why do you think natural disasters are a target for mis- and disinformation? How do you determine whether climate information on social media is accurate? How do you think AI will affect climate misinformation online?

• Resource: “Misinformation” (Checkology virtual classroom).

• Related:

- “Falsehoods follow close behind this summer’s natural disasters” (Tiffany Hsu, the New York Times).

- “Climate disasters are on the rise. So is disinformation.” (Kristoffer Tigue, Mother Jones).

- “China targets U.S. voters With new AI misinformation techniques” (Emma Woollacott, Forbes).

3. Should the government contact tech companies about content moderation? Not according to a federal appeals court ruling Sept. 8, which found that the Biden administration probably violated the First Amendment when pressuring social media companies to limit misinformation about topics such as the coronavirus and vaccines. The court wrote: “Social-media platforms’ content-moderation decisions must be theirs and theirs alone.”

• Discuss: Do you agree with the court ruling? Why or why not? How much sway do you think the government should have over what people post on social media? How can social media content be moderated for harmful or false information?

• Related:

- “How much control should a government have over citizens’ social media content?” (Michel Martin, NPR).

- “Court eases curbs on Biden administration’s contacts with social media firms” (Nate Raymond and Jonathan Stempel, Reuters).

• Resource: “The First Amendment” (Checkology virtual classroom).

RumorGuard rundown

You can find this week’s rumor examples to use with students in these slides.

No, videos don’t show genetically modified mosquitoes being dropped from the sky

NO: The video referenced above does not show mosquitoes being dropped from a helicopter, and an additional video does not show them being dropped from a plane.

YES: One clip probably shows a gender reveal party, while the other shows smoke being released during an air show in Cincinnati on Sept. 3.

YES: Mosquitoes that were genetically modified to reduce the mosquito population have been approved to be released (via boxes on the ground) in Florida and Texas as part of a disease control effort.

YES: These videos were used to further conspiratorial and false claims that Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates funded the initiative to spread disease and push his alleged depopulation efforts.

NewsLit takeaway: False claims are often built on previously laid tropes and narratives. A video of smoke billowing from a helicopter may not seem suspicious to most internet users, but those who have been exposed to repeated false claims about population control and Gates may be tempted to believe these clips show mosquitoes being secretly released. News literacy skills, such as reverse image searches, lateral reading and critical thinking, can prevent people from falling into these conspiratorial rabbit holes.

Video of art exhibit misrepresented as showing odd new airline seat

NO: A video does not show a new type of passenger airline seat.

YES: It is footage of an art sculpture, “Premium Economy” by Swedish artist Anna Uddenberg, exhibited at a New York City gallery this year.

YES: Airlines have been squeezing passengers by reducing leg room and adding seats without expanding cabins over the past 15 years.

NewsLit takeaway: Removing interesting and genuine footage from its original context and sharing it as if it pertained to a trending discussion is a surefire way for purveyors of misinformation to get clicks and views. Fortunately, these mislabeled visuals are typically easy to put back into their original context with a quick reverse image search. In this case, the Associated Press traced the footage back to an art gallery and received a comment from the gallery owner, saying: “This is definitely not true! It is an artwork!” This false claim may have seemed genuine to some viewers because airlines have been reducing the size of economy airline seats. The idea of odd seating is not new — such as with double-decker seats — but there’s no evidence airlines are going to start using these seats anytime soon. Still, some people may find themselves asking, “If the airlines would do this, what else might they do?” This thinking is known as a slippery slope, a fallacious argument that says the occurrence of one event will lead to more extreme events, and it is frequently exploited by misinformation.

Kickers

• It’s cool to read the print newspaper, according to Kelsey Russell, a Gen Z influencer and graduate student on TikTok. Under the handle @kelscruss, she creates viral videos sharing her experience reading local papers, the New York Times and more.

• California K-12 students may soon be required to learn media literacy after state legislators passed with bipartisan support bill A.B. 873. The author of the bill and education experts discuss in this KPBS radio show why recognizing credible news online is an essential skill in today’s information landscape.

• As AI makes a bumpy entrance into K-12 schools, some educators are raising concerns about equity and racial bias in the technology.

• Wikipedia excerpts are starting to appear on some TikTok search results pages as users continue to use the platform like a search engine.

• How do social media likes and retweets influence people’s views on policy issues? Overall, not so much, researchers found — unless they actively used Facebook or X for more than an hour a day.

• A mushroom guidebook should give accurate advice on which mushrooms are edible or poisonous, but that’s not the case with a guide recently removed from Amazon — part of a growing problem with some AI-generated books for sale, which not only contain inaccurate information but also use tools trained on copyrighted works of writers and artists.

• What Swiftie wouldn’t enjoy this beat? Two job ads for reporters exclusively covering pop stars Taylor Swift and Beyoncé were posted by Gannett in a move that attracted criticism in light of the newspaper company’s shrinking workforce and recent layoffs of journalists in local newsrooms.

• New York City is often considered the media capital of the world, but less than 27 percent of NYC high schools have a student newspaper. Students of color address the inequities in this podcast and how they pursue journalism despite the lack of student papers.

• New social media platform Threads has blocked searches related to the coronavirus and vaccines, just as a new wave of cases and baseless claims emerged.

China fuels global surge in mpox cases as LGBTQ+ stigma hampers response

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/22/china-global-surge-mpox-world-health-organization

China is fuelling a global surge in mpox cases, accounting for the majority of new cases reported in September, according to the World Health Organization.

The number of weekly cases reported globally increased by 328% in the week to 10 September, data shows. Most of that rise came from China, where more than 500 new cases were reported in August. The WHO said China was experiencing “sustained community transmission” of the virus, which was first detected as an imported case in September last year.

Mpox was previously known as Monkeypox but renamed by the WHO in 2022 in an effort to help tackle discrimination and stigma.

In July, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported for the first time that the disease was spreading domestically, with 106 cases recorded in June. Since then cases have surged by nearly 400%, with the true number of infections thought to be much higher than the official count.

Five women tested positive for the disease in August, leading to concerns that the virus, which has predominantly been found among men who have sex with men, is spreading more widely.

On Wednesday, the Chinese government started treating mpox under the same protocols as Covid-19, meaning that the authorities can take emergency measures such as restricting gatherings to curb the spread of the disease.

The majority of mpox cases since 2022 have been in men who have sex with men and 92.5% of cases in August were among that demographic. But in recent years the pressure on LGBTQ+ activists in China has increased, limiting their ability to advocate and increasing the social stigmatisation of LGBTQ+ people.

Experts believe that this could make people less likely to get tested. Vaccinations are not available in mainland China, although state media reported that a domestic vaccine is being developed. “Public health concerns are one of the only ways of discussing gay men in public discourse,” said Chuncheng Liu, a medical sociologist. “[But] you cannot rely on scaring people to come to you for help.”

In August, several accounts on the messaging app WeChat dedicated to gay, trans and feminist issues were closed down without explanation. In May, the Beijing LGBT Center, one of China’s best known LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, closed down for undisclosed reasons. It had been one of the last active civil society groups after LGBT Rights Advocacy China, another influential NGO, closed in 2021.

The closures had a “huge influence for the community”, said one LGBTQ+ activist, who left China in recent years because of pressure from the authorities, “because it says that the government is still trying to target them”.

While the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention has been publishing reports about mpox, and there is uncensored information on social media about recognising symptoms, Liu noted that LGBTQ+ people might not be following those accounts. “The problem is not about information or about a specific message,” Liu said. It is about how to “circulate this message to the community”.

A report published in September by Outright International, a New York-based LGBTQ+ rights organisation, said activists in China were “increasingly restricted” by the government. One anonymous activist said police had encouraged them to “just focus on providing services like HIV prevention and care”, while groups that mention the words “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer” are often refused official registration.

Many LGBTQ+ groups started out with a focus on HIV/Aids awareness, making their case to the authorities on the grounds of public health rather than political rights.

In the early 2010s, as HIV/Aids prevention and treatment became more established in China, support from international donors such as the Global Fund and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, started to dry up. And in 2016, Beijing passed a foreign NGO law that restricted the ability of domestic groups to work with foreign organisations or receive international funding.

Additional research by Tau Yang and Tzu-Wei Liu

China sentences Uyghur academic to life in prison in Xinjiang

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/09/22/rahile-dawut-life-sentence-uyghur-china/2023-09-22T03:02:52.597Z

Rahile Dawut, a prominent Uyghur academic who disappeared seven years ago at the height of the Chinese government’s crackdown in Xinjiang, has been given a life sentence in prison, according to a human rights group that has worked for years to locate her.

Dui Hua, a California-based rights group said in a statement Thursday that the 57-year-old professor — who was convicted in 2018 on charges of endangering state security by promoting “splittism” — had lost an appeal of her sentence in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region High People’s Court.

As crackdown eases, China’s Xinjiang faces long road to rehabilitation

A former professor at Xinjiang University and leading scholar on Uyghur folklore, she is among more than 300 intellectuals, artists and writers believed to be detained in Xinjiang, amid a government campaign to better assimilate China’s Muslim minority and promote ethnic harmony. Rights groups have accused the Chinese government of committing “cultural genocide” by wiping out previously vibrant local Uyghur culture.

“The sentencing of Professor Rahile Dawut to life in prison is a cruel tragedy, a great loss for the Uyghur people, and for all who treasure academic freedom,” said John Kamm, executive director of the Dui Hua Foundation.

Dawut’s daughter, Akeda Pulati, said in a statement from the group, “I worry about my mother every single day. The thought of my innocent mother having to spend her life in prison brings unbearable pain. China, show your mercy and release my innocent mother.”

Last year, the United Nations High Commissioner for human rights, after a visit to Xinjiang and months of interviews, concluded that the Chinese government had committed violations that may amount to “crimes against humanity.”

Dawut’s case underlines the lengths of the government’s ongoing campaign where even public intellectuals firmly part of the establishment have been targeted.

A member of the Chinese Communist Party for many years, she received awards and grants from China’s Ministry of Culture, according to Dui Hua. Her work at Xinjiang University, which included the founding of an Ethnic Minorities Research Center in 2007, was also funded by the government.

In 2014, another prominent academic, Ilham Tohti who taught at Minzu University in Beijing, was sentenced to life in prison.

E.U.’s Sakharov human rights prize awarded to jailed Uighur intellectual, probably angering China

Dawut’s family announced her disappearance in 2018 and in 2021, former co-workers told Radio Free Asia that she had been imprisoned and sentenced but no details as to the length of her sentence were given.

“Confirmation of Rahile’s life sentence should give us pause to grasp the ruin visited on family lives of China’s genocide,” said Uyghur Human Rights Project’s director of research, Henryk Szadziewski.

“The Chinese state has taken a wrecking ball to any expressions of Uyghurness outside of its purview. As a gifted academic documenting Uyghur knowledge, targeting Rahile is no coincidence.”

[World] Do China's recent military purges spell trouble for Xi Jinping?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-66875526?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=KARANGA