The U.S. Congress and the Administration’s China Committee (CECC) said in a study that the Chinese government is increasingly using the “Xinjiang model” to restrict the practice of Islam and identity among the Hui community and the Hui people as it suppresses the Uighur and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang.
In this staff report, entitled “Hui Muslims and the “Xinjiang Model” of State Repression of Religion,” the bipartisan, bicameral U.S. congressional body says that despite its previous relatively lenient policies toward Hui Muslims, the Chinese government’s official rhetoric and policies regarding the practice and identity of Islam by Hui communities and individuals are becoming less tolerant. Policies are becoming less tolerant.
The just-published study reports that the Communist authorities’ restrictions on Islam are increasingly similar to those imposed on the Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang with respect to the Hui community and Muslims. In addition to being held in mass detention camps in Xinjiang along with Uighurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz and others, authorities have adopted what some call a “Xinjiang model” of intrusive and repressive religious policies against Hui Muslims.
Reports indicate that, like Uighurs and other predominantly Muslim minorities, Hui are held in detention camps by the Chinese Communist Party for their Islamic-related activities.
Cover of the Congressional and Executive Commission on China (CECC) Staff Report on Hui Muslims and the “Xinjiang Model” of State Repression of Religion. (March 2021)
The reasons for their detention include advocating for religious freedom for Muslims, reading the Qur’an in mosques, teaching the Qur’an via WeChat, conducting Islamic funerals, viewing online religious media content, funding mosque construction, “teaching the Qur’an privately,” and living and studying in Pakistan.
The report argues that this shift in policy is due in part to the conflation of Islamic identity with extremism by Chinese officials and the Chinese government’s campaign to “Chinese-ize Islam.
In February, following a New York Times story, “China’s Muslim Crackdown Extends to Sanya,” people at a halal restaurant in Sanya’s Huihui district confirmed to Voice of America that authorities had asked them to remove the word “halal” from the restaurant’s signage and menu, and that “Allahu Akbar” markings on homes and stores were also required. The authorities have asked them to remove the word “halal” from restaurant signs and menus, and to scrape or cover up “Allahu Akbar” signs on homes and stores, but a ban on girls wearing headscarves in schools has not been implemented due to public opposition.
As the Uighur and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang have been cracked down on by authorities in recent years, a growing number of Chinese Hui Muslims feared at the Time that they would be the next target of a crackdown by authorities. Mosques in some places have been forcibly demolished by the authorities.
According to official Communist Party figures, China’s Hui population is more than 10 million. Of China’s 55 legal ethnic minorities, the Hui are the only ethnic group that uses religion (Islam) as a unifying identity, but many Hui members do not practice Islam. Although the Hui are distributed throughout China and speak different dialects, unlike Turkic-speaking peoples, they are often considered to be Chinese speakers.
The Congressional and Executive Commission on China, an agency established by the U.S. Congress in 2000, focuses on human rights and rule of law developments in China and submits an annual report to Congress and the President. The current chair of the Commission is Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley and co-chair is Democratic Congressman Jim McGovern.
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