Whereas Uyghurs in China face worsening repression by the
Government of China, through increasing controls on religious, political, and
cultural activity, and through increasing security restrictions, deprivations
of due process, forcible disappearances, torture, and extrajudicial
killings;
Whereas as a result of this institutionalized
discrimination by the Government of China against Uyghurs, confrontations
between Uyghurs and Chinese police have intensified since July 5, 2009, when
violence broke out in Urumqi during initially peaceful protests, reportedly
resulting in the deaths of 197 people and the detention of more than 1,400
people;
Whereas hundreds of persons detained after the July 2009
riots have not been accounted for by the Government of China, and serious
allegations of torture and other human rights abuses by Chinese police have
gone uninvestigated;
Whereas many of the Uyghurs detained in relation to the
July 2009 events are feared to have been subjected to torture and forced
confessions during their imprisonment;
Whereas trials for many of the Uyghurs charged in relation
to the July 2009 events have lacked transparency, and defendants have allegedly
been denied the right to choose their attorneys;
Whereas at least 24 Uyghurs and 2 Han Chinese have been
sentenced to death, 9 individuals have been sentenced to death with a 2-year
reprieve, 8 Uyghurs and one Han Chinese man have been executed, and several
more individuals have been sentenced to life in prison or given jail terms in
connection with the July 2009 events;
Whereas, on July 18, 2011, reports indicate that Uyghurs
in Khotan who had gathered at a local bazaar to peacefully protest repressive
Chinese policies were arrested by Chinese police, prompting an angry crowd to
follow the police to the police station, where violence broke out;
Whereas at least 4 people were reportedly killed as a
result of the July 18, 2011, clashes, and an estimated 70 people were allegedly
arrested in connection with the event;
Whereas, on the weekend of July 30, 2011, a series of
knife and bomb attacks took place in the city of Kashgar, resulting in the
deaths of several people;
Whereas in September 2011, 2 men were given 19-year prison
sentences, and 4 men were sentenced to death by a Chinese court for their
alleged involvement in the July 30, 2011, and July 31, 2011, attacks;
Whereas the 4 condemned men were allegedly tortured into
giving confessions and were denied adequate legal representation during their
trials, despite Chinese claims that their trials were open and fully
protected the suspects’ legal rights
;
Whereas, on December 28, 2011, during an official 100-day
Strike Hard
campaign in Xinjiang, Chinese forces fired on a
group of Uyghurs in Khotan;
Whereas 7 members of the Uyghur group were
reportedly killed, along with a Chinese security officer, while 4 Uyghurs were
injured, and 4 adults and up to 5 children from the group, ages 7 to 17, were
and continue to be detained following the clash;
Whereas the whereabouts of these detained individuals are
unknown, but they are believed to still be held in detention in China, and are
feared to have sustained serious injuries;
Whereas in addition to severely mistreating Uyghurs within
China, in the last few years, the Government of China has reportedly increased
its pressure on other countries, including Cambodia, Kyrgyzstan, Laos,
Malaysia, Nepal, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, to return Uyghurs who had sought
asylum in those countries back to China;
Whereas arbitrary arrests, torture, harsh prison
sentences, and forced disappearances have been carried out against
asylum-seeking Uyghurs who have been forcibly returned to China, in violation
of the principle of nonrefoulement;
Whereas at least 20 Uyghurs who had fled to Cambodia to
seek asylum following the violence in 2009 were forcibly returned back to China
from Cambodia on December 19, 2009;
Whereas 2 days following the extradition of the Uyghurs
from Cambodia, China awarded Cambodia with an agreement to provide a United
States $1,200,000,000 aid and loan package;
Whereas after more than 2 years of not knowing the fate of
the returned Uyghurs, recent reports indicate that 4 of the Uyghurs have been
sentenced to life in prison, 12 have been sentenced to terms of between 16 and
20 years, and a woman and 2 children have been released, while the fate of the
remaining Uyghurs remains unknown;
Whereas according to news accounts, the Uyghurs’ trials
were fundamentally unjust, in that defense attorneys were given insufficient
time to prepare a defense, families of the accused were prevented from
attending the trials, and the accused were forced to cover their faces while
entering and exiting the courtroom;
Whereas Uyghur refugee Ershidin Israel was forcibly
returned to China from Kazakhstan in May 2011, in violation of customary
international law as well as the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of
Refugees and the 1967 Protocol, to which Kazakhstan is a party;
Whereas 11 Uyghur refugees were extradited from Malaysia
to China in August 2011, while 5 Uyghur refugees remain in Malaysia; and
Whereas Nur Muhammed, a Uyghur, was arrested in Thailand
on August 6, 2011, charged with illegal entry into the country, and handed over
to Chinese authorities at the airport in Bangkok, rather than being brought
before a court as required under Thai law, and has since disappeared: Now,
therefore, be it
That the House of
Representatives—
(1)strongly condemns any violence against
innocent individuals regardless of their ethnicity, gender, or religious
beliefs, and recognizes that individuals who have committed crimes must be
brought to justice in full compliance with international human rights and legal
standards, including independent courts, habeas corpus and due process
protections, the free choice of legal defense, and the right to challenge the
accuser and any evidence in court;
(2)recognizes that
the government policies of suppression against the Uyghurs in Xinjiang,
particularly the Strike Hard
campaigns, as well as government
policies regarding other ethnic groups within the People's Republic of China,
have created an atmosphere of ethnic tension in those areas;
(3)calls on the
Government of the People's Republic of China to—
(A)desist from
further executions based on trials that violate international human rights and
due process standards;
(B)ensure that trials
are conducted in an open and transparent manner in accordance with the
international obligations of the People's Republic of China;
(C)allow
international observers and the media to attend those trials;
(D)provide a list of
all individuals detained or arrested in the aftermath of the July 2009 events
in Xinjiang to the International Committee of the Red Cross and the public, and
to grant access to those individuals for family members and independent legal
counsel;
(E)cease all
government-sponsored crackdowns against people in the Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region, including against people involved in peaceful protests or
religious or political expression; and
(F)refrain from
pressuring or requesting other governments to forcibly return Uyghurs to China;
and
(4)calls on the
President of the United States to—
(A)unequivocally
state the strong opposition of the United States to the legally flawed trials,
executions, and harsh prison sentences against peaceful Uyghur
protestors;
(B)raise those human
rights concerns publicly and in all meetings with Chinese officials;
(C)restate the
interest of the United States to open United States consulates in Lhasa, Tibet,
and in Urumqi, Xinjiang; and
(D)as a matter of
policy, direct the United States Embassy in Beijing to automatically request
permission from the appropriate Chinese authorities for United States Embassy
staff to observe trials if credible reasons exist that such trials may not meet
internationally recognized human rights and legal standards.