Globalizing minority persecution: China's transnational repression of the Uyghurs

ABSTRACT

The Chinese Communist Party has unleashed a campaign of repression against Turkic minorities residing in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). This campaign does not stop at China's borders. This study introduces the Transnational Repression of Uyghurs Dataset, which contains 7108 cases of Uyghurs being targeted in 44 states from 1997 to 2021, the largest public dataset on transnational repression published to date. Unlike other regimes, the Chinese state has been indiscriminate in its persecution, often pursuing apolitical diaspora members on account of their ethnicity rather than political activism. China's transnational repression of Uyghurs has expanded rapidly in recent years as domestic repression has increased in XUAR. We documented 238 incidents from 1997 to 2014, and an additional 6870 events since 2014. The paper argues that globalization is producing a new trend of transnational minority persecution, offering new insights for our understanding of twenty-first century genocides and minority persecution.

KEYWORDS:

• China
• transnational repression
• authoritarianism
• minorities
• surveillance

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Although we use the term Uyghur, we include other Turkic groups from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, including Kyrgyz, Kazakhs and Uzbeks as well as non-Turkic groups such as Tajiks.

2 These 44 countries are: Afghanistan, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia, Canada, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Malaysia, Morocco, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkey, United States, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

3 The difference in stages is due to available information about each of the different types of incidents, including thousands of cyberattacks that did not reveal targeted individuals to protect them from further harassment and intimidation.

4 The PRC also accused Ankara of intentionally funnelilng Uyghur fighters to the conflict in Syria, where several communities were emerging at the time.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Edward Lemon

Edward Lemon is Research Assistant Professor at the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University, Washington DC.

Bradley Jardine

Bradley Jardine is Research Director at the Oxus Society for Central Asian Affairs and Global Fellow at the Kissinger Institute on China and the US at the Wilson Center.

Natalie Hall

Natalie Hall is a graduate student at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University.