Chinese Government Forces Uighur Muslim Women To Take Birth Control Pills & Have Abortions

By Ameera Rosli  •  30 Jun 2020 in News

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It’s been years since the world found out about the abysmal treatment of Uighur Muslims in the province called Xinjiang in China.

Among the horrid punishments implemented by the Chinese government to the Uighur are being forced to eat pork and consume alcohol, be imprisoned in detention camps, watch their loved ones killed in-front of their eyes and abandon their religious beliefs.

Even tourists entering Xinjiang are being monitored and berated for bringing in any Islam-related materials. The border patrol even took it a step further by installing spyware in tourists’ phones without their consent to collect data on those entering their province.

For years, many Uighur are being oppressed and tortured at the concentration camps and today, the Chinese government has begun to take drastic measures to ensure the Uighur population will decline and gradually cease to exist.

To do this, according to AP News, the government is forcing these Uighur to take birth control, insert IUD against their will and perform abortions to terminate pregnancy. Simultaneously, the country’s Han majority are being encouraged to have more children.

Being ripped away from their parents and raided by the authorities, Uighur children live in constant fear.

The detest towards Uighur newborns only worsens the current situation, leading to what historic researchers call “demographic genocide.” Even if children are not taken away, parents must pay huge fines or risk being imprisoned in the internment camps. When these families manage to escape capture or harassment, they live in poverty.

A total of 30 Uighur muslims have been interviewed after news broke of forced child planning within the community. According to AP News, who investigated this issue, the move was motivated to purge these muslims of their religious faiths thus forcing them to assimilate and abandon Islam altogether.

Darren Byler, an expert on Uighur at the University of Colorado, said,

“The intention may not be to fully eliminate the Uighur population, but it will sharply diminish their vitality. It will make them easier to assimilate into the mainstream Chinese population.”

Others were more critical. Joanne Smith Finley, who works at Newcastle University in the U.K. said,

“It’s genocide, full stop. It’s not immediate, shocking, mass-killing on the spot type genocide, but it’s slow, painful, creeping genocide. These are direct means of genetically reducing the Uighur population.”

Gulnar Omirzakh, a Chinese-born Kazakh vegetable trader, was one of the victims of China’s crimes against Uighur muslims. After she had her third child, an IUD was inserted into her against her will. Her home was invaded by officials in military uniform who urged her to pay a fine of US$2,685 (RM13,022) in exchange for allowing her to keep her children. She tearfully said,

“God bequeaths children on you. To prevent people from having children is wrong. They want to destroy us as a people.”

Uighur women have now become sterile after being force-fed various types of medication that will prevent them from having children. Many suffer from illnesses and most stopped getting their period. The Chinese government even brainwashes the community, stating that those with many children are uneducated, wild and uncivilised.

Tursunay Ziyawudun, a former detainee, lives the remainder of her life in pain after being injected multiple times and even kicked in the stomach by interrogators to ensure her impotence. She suffered from a bleeding womb and she often doubles-over in excruciating pain from the injuries.

Sometimes, new mothers, often still producing breast milk, are left baffled and in shock when their newborns are taken away from them at birth. At the concentration camp, wails of pain and sadness can be heard echoing the confines.

In 2018, over 330,000 IUDs were given to Uighur. Statistically, the number would have gone up by at least half, making it 666,000 by 2020.

Pregnancy should be a joyous celebration, especially to young couples who are expecting, but in Xinjiang, it instills grave fear in mothers who go into it knowing that their children will either be killed or taken away.

To find out more about the plight of the Uighur in China, read this.

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