Page 168 - Communist Chinas Policy of Oppression in East Turkestan

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months of 2001, 1,781 people were executed. That figure does not in-
clude the 2,960 people still awaiting execution. 32
That figure is more than all the other countries in the rest of the

world combined for the last three years alone. Among those executed
are people from all kinds of social groups, including girls aged 15-16
and religious leaders. The common "crime" of the great majority of
these people was to want to live in freedom in their own country and to
enjoy the most basic human freedoms, those of speech, thought and
worship. Yet in the eyes of the Chinese government, both common
criminals and supporters of democracy are all "counter-revolutionar-
ies." That is why as many people are executed for "thought crimes" as
for ordinary criminal offences. What is more, a number of new methods
have recently been introduced in order for those guilty of "political
crimes" to be executed. The most widespread of these is political de-
tainees are accused of trumped up criminal offences.

Chinese officials have always thought that capital punishment was
necessary in order to keep the public in line and to strengthen the gov-
ernment. For that reason, they choose to parade those to be executed
through the streets and then kill them in full public view. Those to be
killed are brought before the public in handcuffs and made to face the
spectators. Their names and crimes are written on placards hung
around their necks. These scenes of savagery in full public view are also
broadcast live on television.
Following the publication of scenes of mass executions in
Newsweek magazine in 1984, the Chinese government feared that this
might damage the country's image, and issued an order that those con-
demned to die should no longer be paraded through the streets. That
order was subsequently expanded, and the fact that political detainees
had been executed was to be kept secret even from their families. These
instructions did not mean that political killings had been done away
with in China, but that they were still proceeding apace, albeit out of

Communist China’s Policy
of Oppression in East Turkestan