THE EPOCH TIMES January 24, 2021 | Isabel van Brugen
President Joe Biden believes the Chinese regime has committed “genocide” and “crimes against humanity” against Uyghur Muslims in the region of Xinjiang—a designation made by the Trump administration a day before the presidential inauguration.
“President Biden has called the oppression of the Uighurs a genocide, and he stands against it in the strongest possible terms,” Emily Horne, the spokesperson for Biden’s National Security Council, told the Washington Examiner.
The Trump administration made the move of the eve of Biden’s inauguration, marking another tough measures to condemn the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) severe human rights abuses domestically.
The administration also determined that the CCP had committed crimes against humanity in the region, citing Beijing’s detention of more than 1 million Uyghurs and other ethnic or religious minorities, and authorities subjecting the population to forced labor, forced sterilization, and torture.
According to the United Nations, genocide is the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”
While the designation carries no automatic penalties, it marked a rare step for the federal government, which has historically been hesitant to make the move against a key trading partner. The designation may now see more companies and countries pressuring China for transparency on its treatment of minorities.