empty, some are clothing factories… but all minarets have been demolished and Islamic decorations removed… Both mosques in my village [including the one still operating] had minarets demolished.126 Witnesses also mentioned that Islamic crescents and Arabic script had been removed from the remaining mosques as well as from other cultural and religious sites, including gravesites. “Some mosques were demolished… others had crescents taken off and Chinese flags put up in their place… Crescents were also taken off gravesites. For example, my mother died, and my brother had to take the crescent off the gravestone. Officials in the village made him do it,” Abzal said.127 “Part of my job was to take crescents off of Muslim gravesites… I used to have to paint over the Arabic words... I painted over my relative’s gravestone,” Mehmet said.128
2.3 THE OMNIPRESENT SURVEILLANCE STATE Muslims living in Xinjiang may be the most closely surveilled population in the world. The government of China has devoted tremendous resources to gathering incredibly detailed information about this group’s lives. This systemized mass surveillance is achieved through a combination of policies and practices that infringe on people’s rights to privacy and freedom of movement and expression. Amnesty International interviewed 65 members of ethnic minority groups who lived in Xinjiang between 2017 and 2021, each of whom described what it was like to experience the government’s system of surveillance. Amnesty also interviewed a Han Chinese person who visited Xinjiang and provided their observations of the surveillance state.129 According to these people, the system of surveillance involves extensive, invasive in-person and electronic monitoring in the form of:
biometric data collection, including iris scans and facial imagery; invasive interviews by government officials; regular searches and interrogations by ubiquitous security officers; “homestays” by government employees and cadres assigned to live with ethnic minority families; an ever-present network of surveillance cameras, including facial recognition cameras; a vast network of checkpoints known as “convenience police stations”; and unfettered access to people’s personal communication devices and financial history.
The information witnesses provided to Amnesty is consistent with what journalists, scholars, and other investigators have revealed about the government’s mass surveillance operation in Xinjiang.130 In addition to providing the government with enormous amounts of personal information, this operation allows the authorities to comprehensively track – in real time – the communications, 126 Amnesty International interview. 127 Amnesty International interview. 128 Amnesty International interview. 129 Amnesty International interview; For another account of a Han Chinese man in Xinjiang see Amnesty International, “Witness to Discrimination: Confessions of a Han Chinese from Xinjiang,” 16 June 2020, www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/06/witness-todiscrimination-confessions-of-a-han-chinese-from-XUAR/ 130 For other articles and reports on surveillance in Xinjiang See Paul Mozur and Aaron Krolik, New York Times, “A Surveillance Net Blankets China’s Cities, Giving Police Vast Powers: The authorities can scan your phones, track your face and find out when you leave your home. One of the of the world’s biggest spying networks is aimed at regular people, and nobody can stop it,” 17 December 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/technology/chinasurveillance.html; Yael Grauer, The Intercept, “Revealed: Massive Chinese Police Database – Millions of Leaked Police Files Detail Suffocating Surveillance of China’s Uyghur Minority,” 29 January 2021, theintercept.com/2021/01/29/china-uyghur-muslim-surveillance-police/; Darren Byler, Noema Magazine, “The Xinjiang Data Police: In western China, the government has deputized an army of mostly young men to surveil the digital and real lives of people in their own communities,” 8 October 2020, www.noemamag.com/the-XUAR-data-police/; Darren Byler, Prospect Magazine, “Big Brother vs. China’s Uighurs: Constant surveillance, cultural suppression and ‘re-education’ are the day-to-day reality for China’s Muslim minorities. And the technology giants that enable it are closer than we might thing,” 28 August 2020, www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/big-brother-vs-chinas-uighurs; Human Rights Watch, “China’s Algorithms of Repression: Reverse Engineering a Xinjiang Police Mass Surveillance App,” 1 May 2019, www.hrw.org/report/2019/05/01/ chinas-algorithms-repression/reverse-engineering-xinjiang-police-mass; Megha Rajagopalan, BuzzFeed News, “This is What a 21st-Century Police State Really Looks Like,“ 17 October 2017, www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/the-police-state-of-the-future-is-already-here#.kxxwXj8MMB; Josh Chin and Clement Burge, The Wall Street Journal, “Twelve Days in Xinjiang; How China’s Surveillance State Overwhelms Daily Life,” 19 December 2017, www. wsj.com/articles/twelve-days-in-XUAR-how-chinas-surveillance-state-overwhelms-daily-life-1513700355
“LIKE WE WERE ENEMIES IN A WAR” CHINA’S MASS INTERNMENT, TORTURE AND PERSECUTION OF MUSLIMS IN XINJIANG Amnesty International
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