As the newest testimony from within Chinas Uighur concentration camps is painting a harrowing picture of systematic rape as a means- and result- of warfare against civilian populations, it appears that the global scourge of sexual violence is more acute than ever. The focal point is Beijings campaign in Chinas Xinjiang province, where under the guise of washing brains, cleansing hearts, strengthening righteousness and eliminating evil, the Xi administration has ruthlessly pursued a strategy of mass surveillance, detention, indoctrination and family separation against the Uighur people since 2014.
Tursunay Ziawudun, a Uighur woman who returned to Xinjiang after a five-year stay in Kazakhstan, was twice detained by Chinese authorities. Her second detention was immeasurably more violent than the first: During the night, Ziawudun says, men in suits would select women as if they were cattle, later taking them to a black room without cameras. Ziawudun says she was tortured and gang-raped on three occasions and watched on as her cellmates endured the same treatment.
Inside Xinjiangs camps
On the outside, Beijing has long implemented a bizarre, but no less perverse, policy for Uighur women and their families. Since 2017, Chinas Pair Up and Become Family policy has seen ethnic Han Communist Party officials take up part-time residence at Uighur households, during which time they share meals, discuss Communist Party political ideology and, reportedly, help themselves to the marital beds of their Uighur hosts. In other reports, Uighur women attest to having been forcibly sterilized to prevent the growth of their families.
The trauma inflicted upon these women and their families is leaving a lasting impact on their lives that will reverberate through even future generations. Worse, the survivors cannot expect any help or support and are even shunned by their families in some cases. However, overcoming trauma not only requires an adequate support system that provides health and shelter, but also, very importantly, a mechanism to pursue justice and have their voices heard at the international level.
The Lai Dai Han and the role of justice
Indeed, helping victims overcome their experiences cannot, and should not, entail only the provision of shelter and medical assistance to survivors. In every case, drawing attention to the issue at hand and seeking justice for victims is critical if true healing is to ever take place. Yet if the past is a lesson, the issue of justice and being taken seriously is perhaps the greatest obstacles for victims of sexual violence during conflict. A poignant case in point is that of the Lai Dai Han community in Vietnam who have been living, breathing proof of the need for a survivor-centered approach to cases of sexual violence.
During the Vietnam War, more than 300,000 South Korean soldiers were deployed to fight alongside US troops on the ground. The combined forces were responsible for an incalculable number of war crimes, including the rape of tens of thousands of Vietnamese women and girls at the hands of South Korean soldiers. Of the survivors of these crimes, 800 women are still alive today, and their story lives on through their dual-heritage children known as the Lai Dan Han, a derogatory term meaning mixed blood.
Rejected from society because of their perceived ethnic impurity, their fate could be an indication of what the Uighur women and their offspring will be facing soon. Rejected from Vietnamese society, the Lai Dai Han are living in abject poverty and are barred from receiving social services, education and employment. So far, the South Korean government has never even acknowledged that its soldiers committed these war crimes, meaning the Lai Dai Han have been fighting for justice for decades.
High on the UN agenda
It should be noted, however, that the United Nations have begun to allocate significant resources towards helping survivors of sexual violence. In light of violence against women in conflict-ridden Ethiopia where the UN is calling for a zero tolerance policy for crimes of sexual violence during the conflict between the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) UN Women provides accommodation, medical treatment, counselling and legal aid for women and girls, as well as education and self-defense training. The result? A generation of resilient survivors, equipped to rebuild a safer, and happier, future.
Even so, despite all evidence the Ahmed administration has remained tight-lipped about reports about rape by military personnel, all the while Ethiopias UN ambassador claims the country doesnt tolerate sexual violence. Its not surprising that local authorities have so far failed to pursue investigations into reports of rape or provide any assurance that perpetrators will be brought to justice.
Spanning continents, generations and legal battlegrounds, the scourge of sexual violence has never been more pressing than in 2021. Yet with the coronavirus pandemic still wreaking havoc, the already scant resources for prevention and rehabilitation are being stretched thin, according to sexual violence survivor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad. And this is the tragedy of 2021: for its not enough for the world to battle one very public health crisis while leaving another to fester beneath the surface.