Rogue Nation

China's DNA database in East Turkestan is in gross violation of international human rights norms
By Christopher Carbone

Chinese state terrorism in East Turkestan.

China is collecting DNA and other biometric data from the population in East Turkestan is a “gross violation” of global norms, Human Right Watch said Wednesday.
Authorities have collected DNA samples, fingerprints, iris scans, and blood types of all residents in the region between the ages of 12 and 65.

The DNA and blood types are being collected through a free annual physical exams program called Physicals for All, the human rights groups said.
The ongoing unrest in East Turkestan between Uighurs, a mostly Muslim people, and ethnic majority Han Chinese, has resulted in hundreds of people being killed and a sweeping security crackdown by the communist country, which blames Islamist militants for the fighting.
“East Turkestan authorities should rename their physical exams project ‘Privacy Violations for All,’ as informed consent and real choice does not seem to be part of these programs,” Sophie Richardson, China director of Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang, asked about the report by Human Rights Watch, accused the group of making “untrue” statements.
Reuters reports that government workers have to “earnestly safeguard the peoples’ legal rights,” but the plan set forth made no mention of a need to inform people fully about the campaign or of any option for people to decline to take part.
State media have said participation in the physical exams was "voluntary". 

Richardson said it is not.
“The mandatory databanking of a whole population’s biodata, including DNA, is a gross violation of international human rights norms, and it’s even more disturbing if it is done surreptitiously, under the guise of a free health care program,” Richardson said.
Human Rights Watch cited an unidentified East Turkestan resident saying he feared being labeled with “political disloyalty” if he did not participate, and that he had not received any results from the health checks.
The official Xinhua news agency in November cited health authorities as saying 18.8 million people in the region had received such physicals in 2017, reports Reuters.
Human Rights Watch in May documented the Chinese police’s searchable, nationwide DNA database with 40 million entries from people, including dissidents and migrants. 

A DNA database allows police not only to search for an exact match, but also for those who are related family members.

Widow of Nobel Laureate Feared ‘Disappeared’

Beijing Should Cease Harassment and Detention of Liu Xiaobo’s Supporters
HRW

Liu Xia is shown holding photos of her deceased husband, Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo. 

The Chinese authorities should immediately and unconditionally release Liu Xia, the wife of deceased Nobel Peace laureate Liu Xiaobo, Human Rights Watch said today. 

The government should also stop harassing and detaining Liu’s supporters for commemorating his death.
Since Liu Xiaobo’s funeral on July 15, 2017, following his death from complications of liver cancer on July 13, the authorities have refused to provide information on Liu Xia’s whereabouts, raising concerns that she has been forcibly disappeared.
“Liu Xia has been a prisoner of the state for years simply because of her association with a man whose beliefs the Chinese government cannot tolerate,” said Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch. 

“Her forced disappearance since Liu Xiaobo’s funeral heightens concerns about her well-being and safety.”
Liu Xia was last seen in an official photo taken on July 15, in which she and a few relatives are lowering an urn containing Liu Xiaobo’s ashes into the Pacific Ocean at a beach near Dalian, a city in northeast China. 

Since then, her friends and relatives in Beijing have not been able to reach her directly. 

According to international and Hong Kong media reports, on July 19, authorities have forcibly taken Liu Xia for a “vacation” in the southwestern province of Yunnan.
Liu Xia, 61, is a Beijing-based poet, artist, and photographer. 

She has published collections of poems and her photographic works have been exhibited in France, Italy, the United States, and other countries. 

Liu Xia met Liu Xiaobo through Beijing literary circles and married him when he was imprisoned in a re-education through labor camp in 1996.
Since December 2008, when Liu Xiaobo began serving his most recent sentence for allegedly inciting subversion, Liu Xia has been held arbitrarily under house arrest and deprived of almost all human contact except with close family and a few friends. 

Throughout Liu Xiaobo’s hospitalization, which began in June 2017, Liu Xia was prevented from speaking freely to family, friends, or the media. 

She is known to suffer from severe depression and a heart condition.
An enforced disappearance is defined under international law as the arrest or detention of a person by state officials or their agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty, or to reveal the person’s fate or whereabouts. 

Enforced disappearances place the victim at greater risk of abuse and inflict unbearable cruelty on family members and friends waiting to learn of their fate.
Since Liu Xiaobo’s death, Chinese authorities have also systematically prevented his supporters from holding commemorative activities. 

On July 18, police detained Dalian-based activists Jiang Jianjun and Wang Chenggang for throwing a bottle with a message to Liu at the beach near where Liu’s ashes were scattered. 

Jiang was later given 10 days’ administrative detention. 

It is unclear whether Wang has been released. 

Ding Jiaxi, a Beijing-based human rights lawyer, was detained at a Shenyang police station from July 13 to 15 after he protested in front of the hospital where Liu received treatment. 

Beijing police have held activist Hu Jia under house arrest since June 27 to prevent him from going to the Shenyang hospital or participating in memorial activities.
On July 19, as Liu Xiaobo’s supporters in Hong Kong, Melbourne, London, San Francisco, and elsewhere gathered to mark the seventh day of his death, a traditional Chinese memorial rite, police across China called, summoned, or visited activists at their homes, warning them not to join the commemoration. 

Those who have been harassed include Guangzhou-based activist Wu Yangwei (also known as Ye Du), writer Li Xuewen and rights lawyer Huang Simin, Hangzhou-based writers Wang Yongzhi (also known as Wang Wusi) and Wen Kejian, Shanghai-based activist Jiang Danwen, and activist Hua Chunhui, based in Wuxi, a city near Shanghai.
Liu Xiaobo’s death has also prompted new action by China’s internet censors, Human Rights Watch said. 

On the Twitter-like Chinese microblogging platform Weibo, “RIP,” and the candle emoji were censored. 

On WeChat, a social media platform with more than 700 million daily active users, the number of blocked word combinations have significantly increased, and images related to Liu were filtered even in private one-on-one chats, according to a study by the Canada-based organization Citizens Lab.
After announcing Liu Xiaobo’s death on July 13, Shenyang authorities arranged a private funeral that only Liu Xia, a few of Liu Xiaobo’s relatives, and some state security officials were allowed to attend. 

The funeral was followed by a sea burial.

Authoritie imposed these on the family to prevent having a gravesite that could become a place of pilgrimage for Liu’s supporters. 

Liu’s long-estranged brother, Liu Xiaoguang, later appeared at a government news conference thanking the Communist Party for its handling of Liu’s treatment and funeral.

“Chinese authorities may think they will succeed in expunging all memories of Liu Xiaobo and all he stood for,” Richardson said. 

“But in their torment of Liu Xia, their harassment of his friends, and their efforts to silence his supporters, all they do is inspire greater adherence to those ideas.”

China adopts cybersecurity law in face of overseas opposition

By Michael Martina, Sue-lin Wong

BEIJING -- China adopted a controversial cybersecurity law on Monday to counter what Beijing says are growing threats such as hacking and terrorism, although the law has triggered concern from foreign business and rights groups.
The legislation, passed by China's largely rubber-stamp parliament and set to come into effect in June 2017, is an "objective need" of China as a major internet power, a parliament official said.
Overseas critics of the law argue it threatens to shut foreign technology companies out of various sectors deemed "critical", and includes contentious requirements for security reviews and for data to be stored on servers located in China.
Rights advocates also say the law will enhance restrictions on China's internet, already subject to the world's most sophisticated online censorship mechanism, known outside the country as the Great Firewall.
Yang Heqing, an official on the National People's Congress standing committee, said the internet was already deeply linked to China's national security and development.
"China is an internet power, and as one of the countries that faces the greatest internet security risks, urgently needs to establish and perfect network security legal systems," Yang told reporters at the close of a bimonthly legislative meeting.
More than 40 global business groups petitioned Li Keqiang in August, urging Beijing to amend controversial sections of the law. 

Chinese officials have said it would not interfere with foreign business interests.
Contentious provisions remained in the final draft of the law issued by the parliament, including requirements for "critical information infrastructure operators" to store personal information and important business data in China, provide unspecified "technical support" to security agencies, and pass national security reviews.
Those demands have raised concern within companies that fear they would have to hand over intellectual property or open back doors within products in order to operate in China's market.
James Zimmerman, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, called the provisions "vague, ambiguous, and subject to broad interpretation by regulatory authorities".
Human Rights Watch said elements of the law, such as criminalizing the use of the internet to "damage national unity", would further restrict online freedom.
"Despite widespread international concern from corporations and rights advocates for more than a year, Chinese authorities pressed ahead with this restrictive law without making meaningful changes," Sophie Richardson, China Director at Human Rights Watch, said in an emailed statement.
Zhao Zeliang, director of the Cyberspace Administration of China's cybersecurity coordination bureau, told reporters that every article in the law accorded with rules of international trade and that China would not close the door on foreign companies.
"They believe that [phrases such as] secure and independent control, secure and reliable, that these are signs of trade protectionism. That they are synonymous. This is a kind of misunderstanding, a kind of prejudice," Zhao said.
Many of the provisions had been previously applied in practice, but their formal codification coincides with China's adoption of a series of other regulations on national security and foreign civil society groups.
The law's adoption comes amid a broad crackdown by Xi Jinping on civil society, including rights lawyers and the media, which critics say is meant to quash dissent.
Last year, Beijing adopted a sweeping national security law that aimed to make all key network infrastructure and information systems "secure and controllable".