Democrats and Republicans are stepping up pressure on the Biden administration to strengthen its stand on China’s oppression of its Uyghur minority but are using different tactics.
This week, Representative Ritchie Torres, Democrat of New York, sent a sharply worded letter to Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence, chastising the administration for failing to deliver a report on China’s treatment of the Uyghurs.
On Wednesday, the House passed a Republican-led measure that attempts to force the Biden administration to prohibit contacts with Chinese officials involved in the oppression of the minority group.
The U.S. government declared China’s actions against the Uyghurs to be a genocide in 2021 and passed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which imposed sanctions on China related to human rights violations.
“But since those official actions, there has been radio silence from the intelligence community about the present state of the C.C.P.’s campaign of repression, genocidal campaign against Uyghur Muslims,” Mr. Torres said, referring to the Chinese Communist Party. “So I’m deeply troubled by the deafening silence from the federal government in general and the intelligence community in particular.”
Last year Congress approved a measure requiring the director of national intelligence to produce a public report on China’s human rights abuses of the Uyghurs, which was due in June. In an interview on Wednesday, Mr. Torres, a member of the House’s China committee, said he had crafted the legislation to highlight what he called the Chinese government’s genocidal campaign against the Muslim minority.
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