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> State Department Lawyers Concluded Insufficient Evidence to Prove Genocide in China > The U.S. State Department’s Office of the Legal Advisor concluded earli

> State Department Lawyers Concluded Insufficient Evidence to Prove Genocide in China > The U.S. State Department’s Office of the Legal Advisor concluded earlier this year that China’s mass imprisonment and forced labor of ethnic Uighurs in Xinjiang amounts to crimes against humanity—but there was insufficient evidence to prove genocide, placing the United States’ top diplomatic lawyers at odds with both the Trump and Biden administrations, according to three former and current U.S. officials. https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/19/china-uighurs-genocide-us-pompeo-blinken/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/02/19/china-uighurs-genocide-...

dirtyid 6y ago
Hence why the original Genocide accusation had to be laundered first through Zenz / Victims of Communism, why this "opinion" was commissioned by NED funded Uighur organizations. Why lying Pompeo only backed the genocide label at the end of his term despite your linked assessment by his own state department. It's delusional to think commissioned legal opinions still funded by US interests is going to make genocide stick when state department legal minds could not. Articles like this are, and have always been used for purpose of political theatre.
danShumway 6y ago
But not at odds about the "crimes against humanity" part, right? Basically everyone except the CCP's PR department agrees that China is engaging in an ethnic cleansing. This article isn't disagreeing with that, it's not debating that the State department over-exaggerated or misrepresented the extent of the problem. Instead, it's arguing a semantic point that "cultural" genocide is harder to pin down than overt WW2-style death camps. It argues that if we call this genocide, then nobody will care about a bigger issue down the road. But given that the United States and other allies have been shockingly derelict in holding China to account over what is widely agreed to be an ethnic cleansing, the decay of the word "genocide" as an accurate descriptor of a coordinated effort to eliminate a culture should not be our top worry right now. I do not buy the article's concerns. It is wild to me that people can argue we're being too aggressive talking about China right now. We are not being aggressive enough. International courts are not pursuing China strongly enough right now. The CCP is being ignored even though the actual facts of the case are agreed on by almost everyone even in this article -- that China is attempting to eliminate an entire culture, and they are deploying horrifying methods in the pursuit of that goal.
- dirtyid 6y ago
  >Basically everyone Plurality of countries, including majority Islamic countries, have stated positions that still support Chinese actions in XJ as counter insurgency. CCP has and maintained the dominant narrative. >semantic point Semantics is the only context that matters if the goal is to trigger legal consequences. Cultural genocide doesn't legally exist, it's a more apt label but one that does not have any diplomatic consequences. Hence effort to over-exaggerate, which has and will fail for the simple reasons that 1) it's not correct 2) China has more support. >being too aggressive Outside of possibly a few FVEY countries making effort to coordinate their own deliberations, the majority of the world will not adopt genocide label because they understand the US led initiative is bullshit and self-serving. There's a reason Pompeo tried to bypass straight into genocide despite crimes against humanity being a more appropriate label as determined by the review findings of his own state department. Crimes against humanity, while more formalized than cultural genocide, still does not have comprehensive convention or consequences. No one is obligated to sanction or punish crimes against humanity. And if it ever did, it would open up US actions to similar scrutiny. It's why the Hague Invasion Act exists.
  - danShumway 6y ago
    > including majority Islamic countries Other people have brought this up in other parts of the comment section, but this is the "I have a Black friend" argument against recognizing cultural genocide. My point was that there is not a legitimate debate happening here over the severity of what China is doing, just a semantic debate over what word to use to describe the problem. Unless you're seriously arguing that we should be debating whether or not Uighurs are a "counter insurgency?" But OK, fine, I'll concede that not literally everyone agrees that what China is doing is a human rights violation. Just everyone who's arguing in good faith and paying any attention to the overwhelming evidence of what's happening. > Semantics is the only context that matters if the goal is to trigger legal consequences. You're concerned that the genocide definition won't work in court, and your suggestion is to instead use a term that explicitly does not have legal consequences? You immediately go on to say: > Crimes against humanity, while more formalized than cultural genocide, still does not have comprehensive convention or consequences. This is exactly why the semantic word games people are playing to artificially narrow the definition of genocide have nothing to do with being "precise" and everything to do with removing our responsibility to address the problem. You are yourself claiming that no one is obligated to sanction or hold China accountable under the terminology you want to apply. It's silly and harmful to try and solve the problem of this potentially not holding up in court by making sure that there is no court in the first place and by making sure that no country has any obligation to do anything. > because they understand the US led initiative is bullshit and self-serving China is engaging in the organized torture and elimination of an ethnic group, including systematic rape, reeducation camps, and forced abortions. Get out of here with this "it's just theater" crap, human rights violations at this scale are worth caring about on the international stage. This doesn't need to be a US led initiative, but somebody has to lead it. I am very unsympathetic to claims that I should be more concerned about the US's political goals and posturing than I should be about ethnic cleansing. > it would open up US actions to similar scrutiny This is a false equivalency, the US is not engaged in cultural genocide. But regardless, who cares if it would open the US up to scrutiny? Countries should be sanctioning the United States when it commits crimes against humanity. Please do. This is "both-sides" nonsense. It's saying that because every country has sins that therefore no one ought to address a country that is systematically eliminating an entire culture. It is not a problem if more countries sanction each other over atrocities on this scale. It would be unambiguously good if the international community (including the US) held itself to a higher standard on human rights.

dirtyid 6y ago

Hence why the original Genocide accusation had to be laundered first through Zenz / Victims of Communism, why this "opinion" was commissioned by NED funded Uighur organizations. Why lying Pompeo only backed the genocide label at the end of his term despite your linked assessment by his own state department. It's delusional to think commissioned legal opinions still funded by US interests is going to make genocide stick when state department legal minds could not. Articles like this are, and have always been used for purpose of political theatre.

danShumway 6y ago

But not at odds about the "crimes against humanity" part, right? Basically everyone except the CCP's PR department agrees that China is engaging in an ethnic cleansing. This article isn't disagreeing with that, it's not debating that the State department over-exaggerated or misrepresented the extent of the problem. Instead, it's arguing a semantic point that "cultural" genocide is harder to pin down than overt WW2-style death camps. It argues that if we call this genocide, then nobody will care about a bigger issue down the road. But given that the United States and other allies have been shockingly derelict in holding China to account over what is widely agreed to be an ethnic cleansing, the decay of the word "genocide" as an accurate descriptor of a coordinated effort to eliminate a culture should not be our top worry right now. I do not buy the article's concerns. It is wild to me that people can argue we're being too aggressive talking about China right now. We are not being aggressive enough. International courts are not pursuing China strongly enough right now. The CCP is being ignored even though the actual facts of the case are agreed on by almost everyone even in this article -- that China is attempting to eliminate an entire culture, and they are deploying horrifying methods in the pursuit of that goal.

dirtyid 6y ago
>Basically everyone Plurality of countries, including majority Islamic countries, have stated positions that still support Chinese actions in XJ as counter insurgency. CCP has and maintained the dominant narrative. >semantic point Semantics is the only context that matters if the goal is to trigger legal consequences. Cultural genocide doesn't legally exist, it's a more apt label but one that does not have any diplomatic consequences. Hence effort to over-exaggerate, which has and will fail for the simple reasons that 1) it's not correct 2) China has more support. >being too aggressive Outside of possibly a few FVEY countries making effort to coordinate their own deliberations, the majority of the world will not adopt genocide label because they understand the US led initiative is bullshit and self-serving. There's a reason Pompeo tried to bypass straight into genocide despite crimes against humanity being a more appropriate label as determined by the review findings of his own state department. Crimes against humanity, while more formalized than cultural genocide, still does not have comprehensive convention or consequences. No one is obligated to sanction or punish crimes against humanity. And if it ever did, it would open up US actions to similar scrutiny. It's why the Hague Invasion Act exists.
- danShumway 6y ago
  > including majority Islamic countries Other people have brought this up in other parts of the comment section, but this is the "I have a Black friend" argument against recognizing cultural genocide. My point was that there is not a legitimate debate happening here over the severity of what China is doing, just a semantic debate over what word to use to describe the problem. Unless you're seriously arguing that we should be debating whether or not Uighurs are a "counter insurgency?" But OK, fine, I'll concede that not literally everyone agrees that what China is doing is a human rights violation. Just everyone who's arguing in good faith and paying any attention to the overwhelming evidence of what's happening. > Semantics is the only context that matters if the goal is to trigger legal consequences. You're concerned that the genocide definition won't work in court, and your suggestion is to instead use a term that explicitly does not have legal consequences? You immediately go on to say: > Crimes against humanity, while more formalized than cultural genocide, still does not have comprehensive convention or consequences. This is exactly why the semantic word games people are playing to artificially narrow the definition of genocide have nothing to do with being "precise" and everything to do with removing our responsibility to address the problem. You are yourself claiming that no one is obligated to sanction or hold China accountable under the terminology you want to apply. It's silly and harmful to try and solve the problem of this potentially not holding up in court by making sure that there is no court in the first place and by making sure that no country has any obligation to do anything. > because they understand the US led initiative is bullshit and self-serving China is engaging in the organized torture and elimination of an ethnic group, including systematic rape, reeducation camps, and forced abortions. Get out of here with this "it's just theater" crap, human rights violations at this scale are worth caring about on the international stage. This doesn't need to be a US led initiative, but somebody has to lead it. I am very unsympathetic to claims that I should be more concerned about the US's political goals and posturing than I should be about ethnic cleansing. > it would open up US actions to similar scrutiny This is a false equivalency, the US is not engaged in cultural genocide. But regardless, who cares if it would open the US up to scrutiny? Countries should be sanctioning the United States when it commits crimes against humanity. Please do. This is "both-sides" nonsense. It's saying that because every country has sins that therefore no one ought to address a country that is systematically eliminating an entire culture. It is not a problem if more countries sanction each other over atrocities on this scale. It would be unambiguously good if the international community (including the US) held itself to a higher standard on human rights.