{"id":25581,"date":"2020-06-26T19:22:52","date_gmt":"2020-06-26T19:22:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jww.org\/?p=25581"},"modified":"2020-06-26T19:22:52","modified_gmt":"2020-06-26T19:22:52","slug":"major-advocacy-victory-uyghur-act-signed-into-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/major-advocacy-victory-uyghur-act-signed-into-law\/","title":{"rendered":"Major advocacy victory! Uyghur Act signed into law"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act is now law! Thanks to advocates like you, on June 17 President Trump signed the legislation, bringing us one step closer to halting the crimes against humanity China is actively perpetrating against the Uyghur ethnic and religious minority group of East Turkistan (also known as Xinjiang), China. This legislation marks the first time <\/span>any<\/span><\/em> government has sought to hold Beijing accountable for its relentless campaign of mass surveillance and arbitrary detention of millions of its citizens.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jewish World Watch celebrates this immense achievement alongside the Uyghur diaspora members whose ardent activism on behalf of their relatives, culture, and homeland helped to bring this momentous advocacy victory to fruition. Gulbahar Mamut, a Uyghur advocate and friend who joined JWW at numerous meetings with elected officials to raise awareness about the Uyghur crisis, said, \u201cWe are thrilled by the outcome of these efforts \u2026 I can\u2019t imagine how happy our people are in East Turkistan, although they have no freedom to celebrate it, but they are forever grateful in their hearts. The victory belongs to all of us. Thank you JWW for the support to make this happen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Atrocities<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

Up to two million Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims are currently being arbitrarily detained in concentration-type camps throughout the Xinjiang region of China, with over 10 million more subjected to an extreme surveillance state built on rights deprivation, cultural oppression, and fear. Leaked Chinese government documents have shown that many of the detainees were targeted for religious practices, such as growing a beard or wearing a veil, and not because they posed any security threat. As part of this sinification campaign, nearly half a million Uyghur children have been forcibly separated from their families and placed in boarding facilities where they are stripped of their cultural and religious identity.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Uyghurs in the camps reportedly endure a litany of abuses \u2013 ranging from sanctioned mass rape and extrajudicial killings to outright cultural genocide \u2013 which led Jewish World Watch to determine that <\/span>crimes against humanity<\/span><\/a> are underway. Other organizations have joined in this assessment, including the <\/span>United States Holocaust Memorial Museum<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jewish World Watch has ardently <\/span>advocated<\/span><\/a> for passage of this bill since early 2019. We secured numerous co-sponsorships from Senators and Representatives, largely through partnerships with the <\/span>local Uyghur diaspora<\/span><\/a> community of California, as well as through the thousands of letters sent by you \u2013 our devoted supporters. JWW was one of the <\/span>earliest Jewish organizations<\/span><\/a> to speak out about the Uyghur crisis, <\/span>refusing to stand idly<\/span><\/a> by as China perpetrated the most egregious mass internment of an ethnoreligious minority group since World War II. <\/span><\/p>\n

The Law<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

The Uyghur Act requires the President to submit a report to Congress within 180 days identifying Chinese officials and any other individuals complicit in orchestrating and carrying out atrocities against the Uyghurs and other ethnic Turkic Muslims inside China. Those individuals identified in the report would then be subject to Global Magnitsky sanctions, including asset freezes and visa revocations and denials. The bill also requires the State Department to compile a report on human rights abuses in the region, including estimates on how many people are confined in the camps and the unconscionable conditions they face. U.S. government agencies must also monitor and report on China\u2019s acquisition of technology used for mass detention and surveillance, as well as track alleged harassment or intimidation of Uyghurs and other Chinese nationals within the United States.  <\/span><\/p>\n

This law has gone through numerous iterations and required years of passionate advocacy. Earlier this year, it seemed that the legislation had reached an impasse and that this opportunity to promote justice and prevent further atrocities would be lost. Fortunately, members of Congress on both sides of the aisle realized that the atrocities being perpetrated against the Uyghurs could not go unchecked. The Uyghur Human Rights Act of 2020 passed both chambers in record time, with overwhelming bipartisan approval. We applaud the members of Congress and the Administration for answering our collective pleas to not stand idly by in the face of unconscionable human rights abuses.  <\/span><\/p>\n

What is Next?<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

While passage of the law is indeed a watershed moment in addressing the Uyghur crisis, the most important work is just beginning. First and foremost, the law must be implemented in its entirety. There are provisions in the law that give the President leeway to hold off on sanctions should he interpret them as interfering with the national interest. We must be vigilant to ensure this discretion is narrow and limited so that the heart of this law is not buried in bureaucracy. Already, Uyghur <\/span>diaspora members are mobilizing<\/span><\/a> to push the Trump Administration to begin the Global Magnitsky sanctions regime against those Chinese officials who are the architects of these atrocities.   <\/span><\/p>\n

Moreover, if the Trump Administration has taken the crucial step of criticizing Beijing in such a direct way and authorizing mechanisms for holding perpetrators accountable, it must <\/span>encourage other nations<\/span><\/a> to follow suit. When it comes to atrocities on such a profound scale that tear away at the very fabric of human dignity, all nations must rise up to decry these abuses or else risk complicity through silence. The scale and egregiousness of China\u2019s abuses against the Uyghurs provide the ideal opportunity for sending a message to all rights-effacing regimes that such atrocities will not be tolerated.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beyond the Uyghur Act, other legislative initiatives demand our attention. Our continued engagement on this crisis will ensure that the momentum created by the Uyghur Act\u2019s passage is not lost. The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (H.R. 6210 and S.3471) is designed to disentangle U.S. companies from goods produced by Uyghur forced labor, thereby ensuring that U.S. entities are not indirectly fueling the problem while outwardly criticizing Beijing. <\/span><\/p>\n

The Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) determined that global supply chains are \u201cincreasingly at risk of being tainted with goods and products made with forced labor from the XUAR [Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region].\u201d In its report, the CECC listed major multinational firms suspected of \u201cdirectly employing forced labor or sourcing from suppliers that are suspected of using forced labor,\u201d including Adidas, Nike, Costco, Calvin Klein, Esprit, H&M, Patagonia, Tommy Hilfiger, Coca-Cola, and the Campbell Soup Company. A similar report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said that more than 80,000 Uyghur detainees in the XUAR had been transferred to factories throughout China, where they are forced to produce goods for at least 83 global retailers, including Apple, BMW, The Gap, Samsung, Sony, Lenovo, Dell, HP, L.G., and Volkswagen, and many others. <\/span><\/p>\n

The legislation creates a \u201crebuttable presumption\u201d that goods produced in the region are made with forced labor. Unless companies can provide the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol with \u201cclear and convincing evidence\u201d that the goods are clean, they cannot be imported. The legislation essentially shifts the burden of proof to companies that want to continue producing in the Xinjiang region by requiring them to obtain certification from the U.S. government that goods were not produced using forced labor in Xinjiang. <\/span><\/p>\n

Please take a moment to thank your members of Congress<\/a> for their endorsement of the Uyghur Human Rights and Policy Act, which could not have become law without their support \u2013 or yours. Also, please ask them to co-sponsor<\/a> the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act to ensure the products of these abuses do not make it onto our shores.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act is now law! Thanks to advocates like you, on June 17 President Trump signed the legislation, bringing us one step closer to halting the crimes against humanity China is actively perpetrating against the Uyghur ethnic and religious minority group of East Turkistan (also known as Xinjiang), China. This legislation marks…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":26780,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[147,188],"tags":[155,562,157,143,563,515,186,531,153,187,564],"class_list":["post-25581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-china","category-news-features","tag-china","tag-congressional-executive-commission-on-china","tag-diaspora","tag-jewish","tag-law","tag-rally","tag-united-states","tag-uyghur-act","tag-uyghurs","tag-xinjiang","tag-xuar","category-147","category-188","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}