Uyghur prisoners in China's Xinjiang region "must be shot on sight" if they attempt to flee the "re-education" camps where, according to human rights activists, tens of thousands of people are said to be arbitrarily detained.
A cache of police files, allegedly obtained by hackers and shared with foreign media, also revealed the faces of nearly 3,000 people, including children, who appear to have been confined to facilities due to their religion.
According to reports from the BBC, the photos would be real and the result of facial recognition, while an internal police protocol emerged from the official files that "describes the routine use of armed officers in all areas of the camps, the placement of machine guns and sniper rifles in the watchtowers and the existence of a shooting policy for those who try to escape ".
In other words, the order is to "kill" anyone who tries to escape.
Since yesterday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet is visiting China for the first time since 2005, planning to go to Xinjiang for a few days.
Although the High Commissioner previously said he would require "unrestricted" access to the North West region to conduct an "independent assessment", the terms of his visit were not disclosed and Chinese authorities have insisted they will not allow other than a "friendly visit" for the purpose of dialogue.
The United States is "shocked" by the latest information on abuse in Xinjiang.
This was stated by the spokesman for the State Department, Ned Price, commenting on the publication of several files showing China's abuses against Uyghurs.
China, Price adds, should free those arbitrarily detained.