World Bank ‘funding campaign of repression’ in Xinjiang, says report

WASHINGTON: A new report by a Washington based think tank has accused the World Bank of “funding a campaign of repression” of Uygurs and other Muslim minorities in China’s Xinjiang province.

The Atlantic Council found “significant evidence” that several clients of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a World Bank subsidiary, were “active participants” in a campaign by China for the widespread use of forced labor and forced displacement of people from their land in Xinjiang.

“Several of IFC’s clients are active participants in the implementation of the government’s campaign of repression against the Uyghurs, including forced labor, forced eviction, cultural erasure, and environmental destruction,” the Washington-based think tank said.

According to the report, significant evidence suggests that several of IFC’s clients are active participants in the implementation of China’s campaign of repression against the Uyghur.

“IFC’s failure to adequately safeguard communities and the environment affected by its financing in the Uyghur Region makes the institution complicit in the repression of Uyghur, Kazakh, and other minoritized citizens,” the report said. The IFC-funded companies profiled in this report include multimillion-dollar corporations that serve the international market.

“Their role in state-sponsored repression suggests that the problem extends far beyond a handful of “bad apples.”

“Research suggests that most (if not all) companies operating in the Uyghur Region are complicit in the PRC’s campaign of repression against the indigenous populations there,” the report added.

This report comes as several nations continue to raise a concern about the human rights conditions in Muslim-dominated northwest China.

Earlier this month, French Parliament slammed China’s “genocide” of its Uyghur Muslim people in a resolution that could sour relations between Paris and Beijing.

Last year, similar resolutions were passed by parliaments in Britain, Canada, and the Netherlands last year, and the US government has also condemned what it deems genocide in Xinjiang. (ANI)