Jan. 27 is Holocaust Remembrance Day, which commemorates the millions of people murdered under Nazi rule during World War II, including 6 million Jews. This day marks the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. “Holocaust Memorial Day is a national day of remembrance in the United Kingdom.
In addition to the traditional commemorations, Holocaust Memorial Day 2021 extends to all victims of genocide, including attention to the situation of the Uighurs in Xinjiang. London-based television channel Sky News reported on Jan. 27 that leaders of the British Jewish community said that people have not learned from the horrors of the Holocaust and that the plight of Uighur Muslims in China is strikingly similar to the genocide of European Jews decades ago.
Ephraim Mirvis, chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, said that when the Holocaust first ended, people had high hopes that the horrific disaster was a lesson that would make the world a better place from then on. In fact, he said, people haven’t learned their lesson yet, and something like this is happening again. “We’ve seen various genocides in Bosnia, Cambodia, Darfur, Rwanda, and we’re seeing today the Rohingya and the Uighurs, who are being persecuted in horrific ways.”
The U.S. State Department determined on Jan. 19 that China committed ethnic cleansing and Crimes Against Humanity against the Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang. In a statement, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo condemned China for imprisoning more than 1 million Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang and forcing them to labor, birth control and restricting their religious freedom, among other things.
Jewish community leaders in Britain warned of mounting evidence that the Chinese state orchestrated a campaign to suppress the Uighurs in Xinjiang.
Mia Hasenson-Gross, executive director of the British Jewish human rights group Rene Cassin, said China is effectively trying to “eradicate” the Uighur language, Culture and traditions.
She told Al Jazeera, “We now have the opportunity to stop this from happening, rather than allowing it to escalate to the point where the Uighurs become another genocidal people in our (future) memory.”
She said, “Holocaust Remembrance Day is meant to remind us of the atrocities that can occur and the important lessons we need to learn from the early stages of indifference and complicity that contributed to these eventual acts of actual destruction.”
The international community, including the British government, has accused the Chinese government of putting dozens or millions of Uighurs into concentration camps, forcing them to work, torturing them and forcibly sterilizing them. It is expected that they will follow the U.S. in making the “ethnic cleansing” determination and further pressure on China. Parliamentarians and officials from several countries have already called for a boycott of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.
China denies the allegations, claiming the camps are “re-Education” centers. Chinese officials have long insisted that large-scale “education and training” is necessary in Xinjiang to combat what they call “the three evil forces of extremism, separatism and terrorism” and to promote economic development there.
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