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Hong Kong (CNN) --
China has committed "serious human rights violations" against Uyghur Muslims in its northwestern region of Xinjiang, which could amount to "crimes against humanity," according to a long-awaited report released Wednesday by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
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The 45-page detailed report, released just minutes before outgoing commissioner Michelle Bachelet's term expired at midnight Geneva time, had been repeatedly delayed and China had vehemently opposed its release.
Michelle Bachelet
The report, which documented what it described as arbitrary and discriminatory detention of members of Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim groups in the context of the government's "implementation of counter-'extremism' and counter-terrorism strategies," was hailed by human rights groups as a groundbreaking moment in the effort to hold the Chinese government to account.
The report comes four years after a UN committee of experts drew attention in August 2018 to "credible reports" that more than 1 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities were interned in extrajudicial camps in Xinjiang for "re-education." and indoctrination.
China has steadfastly denied committing rights violations.
It previously said it set up such centers as a way to counter "extremism" in the region, and has since said the facilities were closed, a claim the UN office said it could not verify.
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According to the UN report, "the policies and practices described in (the region) have transcended borders, separating families and cutting off human contacts, while causing particular suffering to Uyghur, Kazakh and other minority families." predominantly Muslim women affected, exacerbated by patterns of intimidation and threats against members of the diaspora community who speak in public".
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The Chinese government, which had repeatedly opposed the report's release, responded in a 131-page document, nearly three times longer than the report itself, denouncing the findings as "based on misinformation and lies fabricated by anti-China forces".
Beijing's response was published by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) alongside its own report after China was given early access to the document to review and respond.
While the report was welcomed by some overseas Uyghurs and human rights activists, any move toward further investigation, as called for in the report, would need the approval of UN member states in a body in which China has considerable influence.
Action on other recommendations in the report, such as the release of arbitrarily detained persons and the clarification of the whereabouts of missing persons, would depend on the cooperation of the Chinese government.
Within Xinjiang
The report focuses on what it describes as "arbitrary detention and related patterns of abuse" inside what Beijing claims are "vocational education and training centers" between 2017 and 2019.
Gulnur Kosdaulet (2nd from left), 48, protests her husband's detention in China in front of the Chinese consulate in Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city, on March 9, 2021.
It concluded that descriptions of detentions during this period "were marked by patterns of torture or other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment."
The report details the findings of what the Office of the High Commissioner describes as years of efforts to analyze and evaluate public documents, open sources and investigative materials.
It also includes information gathered from interviews with 40 ethnic Uyghurs, Kazakhs and Kyrgyz people.
Twenty-six of those interviewed reported that they had been detained or had worked at various facilities in Xinjiang.
"The extent of the arbitrary and discriminatory detention of members of Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim groups... may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity," according to the report.
The UN report said China's "anti-terrorism legal system" is "deeply problematic from the perspective of international human rights norms and standards" and "in practice has led to the large-scale arbitrary deprivation of liberty" of the Uyghurs and other Muslim communities.
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While Beijing prevented the High Commissioner from conducting an on-the-spot investigation, the report included descriptions of those who had experienced the so-called vocational and educational training centers in Xinjiang, in their own words.
"I wasn't told why I was there and how long I would be there. They asked me to confess to a crime, but I didn't know what I was supposed to confess to," a person interviewed by the office said, according to the report.
The report also said nearly all of those interviewed described being given injections, pills, or both regularly, which made them feel drowsy, while some interviewees also spoke of "various forms of sexual violence," including some cases of rape, as well as various forms of sexual humiliation, including forced nudity, according to the report.
The allegations of sexual and gender-based violence "appear credible," the report said, but it is not possible "to draw broader conclusions" about the extent to which they were part of broad patterns within the facility based on existing information, it said.
"The government's blanket denials of all allegations, as well as its gendered and humiliating attacks on those who have come forward to share their experiences, have added to the indignity and suffering of survivors," the report says.
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The report said that while it cannot confirm the number of detainees in the centers, a reasonable conclusion can be drawn from the available information that the number of people in the centers, at least between 2017 and 2019, was "very significant, including a substantial proportion" of Uyghurs and other Muslim minority populations.
This system of detention, according to the report, also occurred in "the context of broader discrimination" against members of Uyghurs and other mainly Muslim minorities based on "perceived security threats" emanating from individual members of these groups.
Those have included undue restrictions on religious identity and expression, and on the rights to privacy and movement.
The report also noted "serious indications" of reproductive rights violations through the "coercive and discriminatory application of family planning and birth control policies."
It also addressed allegations of forced labor in the region, stating that employment schemes purporting to alleviate poverty and prevent extremism "may involve elements of coercion and discrimination on religious and ethnic grounds."
In its response on Wednesday, Beijing said the report "distorts" China's laws and policies.
"All ethnic groups, including the Uyghurs, are equal members of the Chinese nation," China's response read.
"Xinjiang has taken measures to fight terrorism and extremism in accordance with the law, effectively curbing frequent occurrences of terrorist activities. At present, Xinjiang enjoys social stability, economic development, cultural prosperity and religious harmony. people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang live a happy life in peace and contentment."
A separate statement from China's mission to the UN in Geneva described the report as "a farce planned by the US, Western countries and anti-China forces," adding that "the assessment is a political tool" and "a document politicized that ignores the facts."
Whats Next
Over the past four years, the international community within the UN has done little about allegations of human rights abuses in Xinjiang.
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Countries at its main human rights body have not accepted any formal calls for an investigation, while calls by UN experts for China to allow rights monitoring have been met with fierce denials of wrongdoing by Beijing. and no invitation to go check on the spot.
That impasse within the UN has heightened the attention and importance of the High Commissioner's report for those who have sought to hold China accountable within the international system.
The report will not clarify the political challenges to advancing calls for a formal UN investigation, as China has significant influence among UN member states.
But rights activists have said it should be a wake-up call for international action.
Omer Kanat, executive director of the Uyghur Human Rights Project, called the report a "game changer for the international response to the Uyghur crisis."
"Despite strong denials from the Chinese government, the UN has now officially acknowledged that horrible crimes are taking place," he said in a statement signed by a group of 60 Uyghur organizations from 20 countries.
CNN's Richard Roth and Caitlin Hu in New York, Jorge Engels in London, and Nectar Gan in Hong Kong contributed to this report.
UN High Commissioner for Human RightsUyghursXinjiang
