Context: The UN is in negotiations with Beijing for a visit “without restrictions” to Xinjiang to see how the Uighur minority is being treated.

Details:

• At least one million Uighurs and people from other mostly Muslim groups have been held in camps in the northwestern region.
• S. and Australian rights groups accuse Chinese authorities of forcibly sterilising women and imposing forced labour.
• On Saturday, Beijing announced sanctions against two Americans, a Canadian and a rights advocacy body that had criticised its treatment of the Uighurs, which U.S. officials have said constitutes genocide.

Uighurs:

• There are about 12 million Uighurs, mostly Muslim, living in north-western China in the region of Xinjiang, officially known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).
• The Uighurs speak their own language, similar to Turkish, and see themselves as culturally and ethnically close to Central Asian nations.
• They make up less than half of the Xinjiang population.
• Recent decades saw a mass migration of Han Chinese (China's ethnic majority) to Xinjiang, and the Uighurs feel their culture and livelihoods are under threat.

Map:

https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-international/un-in-dialogue-with-china-for-unrestricted-xinjiang-visit/article34186474.ece

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