![. At the same time, the relatively low goodness of fit values of the model indicate that much of the variation in regard to the verdict cannot be explained by any of these variables, and is to be attributed to other variables: in particular, the external and internal changes of the interned person and of their family members, as evaluated by the state.[110]](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Adrian-Zenz/publication/343971049/figure/tbl1/AS:929945580740610@1598727712983/At-the-same-time-the-relatively-low-goodness-of-fit-values-of-the-model-indicate-that_Q320.jpg)
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The Karakax List: Dissecting the Anatomy
of Beijing’s Internment Drive in Xinjiang
Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 8, No. 2, February 2020
Dr. Adrian Zenz [1]
Senior fellow in China Studies
Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation
Abstract
The “Karakax List”, named after the county of Karakax
(Qaraqash) in Hotan Prefecture, represents the most recent
leaked government document from Xinjiang. Over 137 pages,
667 data rows and the personal details of over 3,000
Uyghurs[2], this remarkable document presents the strongest
evidence to date that Beijing is actively persecuting and
punishing normal practices of traditional religious beliefs, in
direct violation of its own constitution.
Specifically, the Karakax List outlines the reasons why 311
persons were interned and reveals the cognition behind the
decision-making processes as to whether individuals can be
released or not. Based on the principles of presumed guilt
(rather than innocence) and assigning guilt through association, the state has developed a highly fine-tuned yet also very
labor-intensive governance system whereby entire family circles are held hostage to their behavioral performance – jointly
and as individuals. Ongoing mechanisms of appraisal and evaluation ensure high levels of acquiescence even when
most detainees have been released from the camps.
The detailed new information provided by this document also allows us to develop a more fine-grained understanding of
the ideological and administrative processes that preceded the internment campaign. In particular, this research paper
Posted on February 17, 2020 by Adrian Zenz
Figure 1. The first (redacted) page of the 137-page
PDF. Source: Uyghur Human Rights Project.
—
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carefully reviews the sequence and timing of events during Chen Quanguo’s first seven months in the region. It is argued
that Chen must have been installed by the central government, possibly during a meeting at the Two Sessions in Beijing
in March 2016 where Xi Jinping, Chen, and Chen’s predecessor in Xinjiang, Zhang Chunxian, were all in the same
place. It is argued that Chen’s role in Xinjiang has not so much been that of an innovator as it has been that of a highly
driven and disciplined administrator, with a focus on drastically upscaling existing mechanisms of investigation,
categorization and internment.
More than any other government document pertaining to Beijing’s extralegal campaign of mass internment, the Karakax
List lays bare the ideological and administrative micromechanics of a system of targeted cultural genocide that arguably
rivals any similar attempt in the history of humanity. Driven by a deeply religio-phobic worldview, Beijing has embarked on
a project that, ideologically, isn’t far from a medieval witch-hunt, yet is being executed with administrative perfectionism
and iron discipline. Being distrustful of the true intentions of its minority citizens, the state has established a system of
governance that fully substitutes trust with control. That, however, is also set to become its greatest long-term liability.
Xinjiang’s mechanisms of governance are both labor-intensive and predicated upon highly unequal power structures that
often run along and increase ethnic fault lines. The long-term ramifications of this arrangement for social stability and
ethnic relations are impossible to predict.
Chinese document: download first twelve rows (redacted)
English document: download an English translation of the first 12 rows (redacted)
1.0 The Karakax List: Background and Overview
Source, Structure and Contents
Only days after the publication of the China Cables on November 24, 2019, Asiye Abdulaheb, who had previously
leaked the China Cables, gave the author a document titled “Students sent to re-education [who are] family members of
those who went abroad and have not returned” ( ). This new file had been leaked by the
same source from within Xinjiang as the other China Cables documents. The file was also given to a Uyghur in exile,
who then gave it to a range of western media outlets. For the purpose of this research, this document is referred to as
the Karakax List.
The leaked document is a 137-page PDF that was likely generated from an Excel spreadsheet or Word table. The
reason for this assumption is that it is made up of spreadsheet or table-like columns and rows, except that some of the
cells contain text that has been cut off. Alternatively, the original data was in the form of a database document, with data
displayed in a table-style column and row format. In either case, the conversion to the PDF format was likely done for the
purpose of leaking it outside the government system. This conversion was done unprofessionally and caused a
(relatively minor) amount of data loss. Importantly, errors like these make it in fact more likely that the document is
authentic as attempts to create a forgery would have aimed for a more perfect look.
The primary purpose of the data set contained in the Karakax List is to systematically present all relevant available
evidence for each “main person” that is used to arrive at a verdict of whether each respective person should be released
or not.
The document contains 667 rows, two of which encapsulate the same data. The resulting 665 individual data rows
contain the unique identities of 311 main persons, with duplicate rows mainly differing between each other in terms of
the final verdict that they render. These 311 main persons have the following in common: a) they are all from Karakax
(Qaraqash) County in Hotan Prefecture, a region with Uyghur population shares over 90 percent; b) they are all related to
persons who have gone abroad and not returned to China ( ); c) they all were at one point interned in what
the state has called “Vocational Skills Education Training Centers” ( ), and what the author refers
to as “Vocational Training Internment Camps” (VTICs); meaning, some of them have a verdict in the document that they
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were released but remain under close scrutiny, and may be re-interned; d) they all are (or were) interned in a VTIC in the
Karakax County seat, as opposed to facilities in or closer to their home regions (townships); this is notable, because
most (or perhaps all) townships have their own re-education facilities. At least in 2014, tougher “problem cases” were
handed over to county seat camps, but it is not clear whether this practice remains in place.[3] Notably, b) is not the
reason why most of them were interned in the first place. Those main persons, along with numerous other interned
persons listed in the document, were interned for all sorts of reasons, with links to anything ‘abroad’ being a significant
but not primary factor.
The contents of the document is structured as follows. The fist 10 columns of each row contain information in relation to
this person, including the location, date and reasons for their re-education internment. The 11 column contains the
largest amount of text, describing each main person’s circle of relatives ( ), community circle ( ) and an
account of their “religious inheritance circle” ( ), the latter referring to the ways in which religious knowledge
was transmitted to the main person through (typically older) family members or other persons.
In total, the document lists 2,802 adult persons, besides hundreds of related minors. Of these 2,802, 1,432 are shown
with their full names and ID numbers, and 1,370 only by name, age, and often address and/or occupation. Of those
with ID numbers, all have IDs from Xinjiang, 1,405 have IDs from Hotan Prefecture, and 1,372 have IDs from Karakax
County (locations of current registration are indicated by the first six digits of the ID). The total number of adults must be
considered an approximation as it might contain several dozen duplicates that result from persons with only names and
no ID numbers, where the document shows ages that only differ by one year. This may have resulted from the age of a
person being recorded at different points in time. In addition, Uyghur names are phonetically transliterated into Chinese,
which can result in several different legitimate character combinations. Duplicates for persons with ID numbers, including
Figure 1. The first (redacted) page of the 137-page PDF. Source: Uyghur Human Rights Project.—
Figure 2. Example of one row with two row numbers and cut-off text fields. The resulting data
loss was most likely caused through the conversion of the original data into the PDF format.
—
th
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all 311 main persons, were checked and eliminated. The same was not done for those without ID numbers, given that
the total number of distinct identities is only incidental to the analysis and verification of the document.
Table 1 shows that when disregarding the subsequent releases from re-education, 656 or 23.4 percent of the 2,802
persons are or were at one point in time interned or imprisoned.
Designation Count Share
Not interned 2,146
Sentenced (prison term) 137 4.9%
In detention center 42 1.5%
In re-education (at peak, disregarding subsequent release verdicts) 477 17.0%
TOTAL 2,802
All forms of internment or prison (at peak point, subsequent
disregarding release verdicts)
656 23.4%
Table 1. Note: The original number of persons in re-education was 484. The table shows a lower number since some of
these were subsequently sentenced to prison terms, and therefore categorized as such in this data set.
The 12 column contains the “overall evaluation recommendation” ( ) or verdict issued by the main
person’s local governing entity. In some instances, a different entity already arrived at a verdict, which is then often stated
at the bottom of the 11 column, in which case the 12 column only contains an “agree” or “disagree”. These verdicts
are essentially based on the totality of the information contained in each row, along with additional information that is
often briefly cited in the verdict text. Most main person have more than one data row. A careful analysis of these rows
shows a logical and chronological evolution of verdicts, which can change from “ongoing study” to “release”, vacillate
between the two, or (much less commonly) take a turn for the worse.
Overall, nearly three-quarters (74.3 percent) of all main persons ultimately ended up with a “release” verdict. When
including those who are now just required to finish the minimum one-year study period, the effective release share
amounts to 87.5 percent. Release verdicts often state that a person first has to complete what is evidently a minimum
one-year study period before they should then be released. It is important to keep in mind that “re-education internment”
for all of these main persons exclusively refers to internment in VTICs. These camps will intern persons for designated
periods of time before releasing them into either community control ( ) or, more commonly, forms of forced
labor. In fact, a number of verdicts bluntly state that persons are to be released into “industrial park employment” (
).
Throughout the document, quite a few of the first 10 data columns are left blank. In this regard, the repeated information
in the document turns out to be a significant benefit, because when taken together, the author was almost always able
to obtain a complete data set for each main person. Duplicate data sets also at times provide more detail, such as
providing more detailed reasons why a person was interned in the first place.
1.2 Significance of the Document
During the past two years, the author has seen a lot of information that is similar to that contained in the Karakax List in
various other documents. However, he has never seen them combined in the same document, and never observed
verdicts and the reasoning behind them. As a result, the information provided in the Karakax List is truly unique in the
public record, yielding powerful new insights about the internal anatomy of the internment campaign and the subsequent
transition into forms of involuntary labor and community control.
th
th th
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In that sense, the Karakax List is the perfectly complementary third leak after the Xinjiang Papers (New York Times),
which largely consisted of higher-level information such as speeches, and the China Cables (International Consortium of
Investigative Journalists), whose most important document was a regulation (titled “telegram”) on how to run the
Vocational Training Internment Camps.
This most recent leak provides the by far most detailed account of the inner decision-making dynamics of Xinjiang
unprecedented campaign of mass internment. While confirming details from countless witness accounts, it reveals the
witch-hunt like mindset that has been and continues to dominate social life in the region.
1.3 Dating the Document
The author has knowledge of the fact that the document must have leaked out of Xinjiang before late June 2019.
Additional confirmation that the data is older than July 31 , 2019, comes from the fact that a file showing public service
jobs, dated on that day, shows different employment designations than the Karakax List for a total of 13 persons that
feature in both documents.[4] At the same time, the most recent date shown in the Karakax List itself is March 8, 28,
2019.
One female features in the Karakax List as a 37-year-old farmer who lives at home. In a secondary document that
contains the identities of 59 persons in the leaked document, the same person is shown as being trained in the field of
elderly care in the Karakax No.2 Farmers and Pastoralists Higher School of Technology ( ).
That training was scheduled to take place between March 2 and May 2, 2019. There are numerous other cases like
hers, but with one notable exception. A 24-year old divorced woman was trained at an educational facility as a waitress
between March 2 and May 2, 2019. The Karakax List shows her working as a waitress.
The most straightforward explanation for all this is that each data row shows information from a different date in time.
Consequently, the age of each row’s information differs. Some of the rows show data that was current in early 2019,
while others contain more recent information, including data entries that are more recent than May 2, 2019. The perhaps
most likely date of the creation of the leaked PDF is close to the time that it was leaked out of Xinjiang, possibly in June
2019.
1.4 Authenticating the Document
Given that it is a data spreadsheet turned into a PDF, the Karakax List possesses no external markings such as stamps
or signatures that could be used to verify its authenticity. Rather, such authentication must be based on its actual
contents.
This report employs a three-step process to verify the authenticity of this document. First, the author verified the
personal identities of 337 persons listed in the document through three other sources: a) a large cache of local Xinjiang
government documents obtained by the author from different local government departments in minority regions (village
to township levels), predominantly Hotan, Kashgar and Kizilsu Prefectures[5]; b) a leaked database with identity
information from the Chinese surveillance company SenseNets; and c) spreadsheets and files obtained from Xinjiang
government websites.
Second, the author verified locations mentioned in the document, most notably the locations of re-education camps.
This will be discussed in section 2.0.
Third, the terminology used in the document was evaluated by comparing it to the terminology found in other
government documents. This will be discussed in sections 3 and 4. However, a brief comparison of the Karakax List to
the main document of the China Cables on how to operate VTICs yields a number of important data points, for example:
Both state that persons must be in VTICs for at least one year.
st
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The VTIC management document (or “telegram”) of the China Cables state that the release of a VTIC detainee
requires a multi-stage approval process, involving detailed reports and cross-checks with the Integrated Joint
Operation Platform (IJOP) to see whether additional issues with them or their family members arose in the
meantime. The Karakax List shows release verdict texts in succinct form, and also recommends people for
release because “no other issues” have arisen.
Both reflect the fact that VTIC detainees are closely monitored after their release. The Karakax List indicates that
persons receive approvals to remain released, meaning that they will be required to return to the VTIC if their
performance does not meet the government’s expectations.
The China Cables telegram mentions three VTIC management areas: “regular” ( ), strict ( ) and
“forceful” or “very strict” ( ). The Karakax List has a separate column for these areas, with the exact same
three area names.
Fourth, the author evaluated the internal consistency of the document (see section 4).
Overall, the document contains a relatively small numbers of mistakes, all of which can be attributed to human error.
Originally, the data contained in the Karakax List was almost certainly entered by hand. For example, there are major
variations in the ways that the re-education camps in which main persons are (or were) interned are named. Similarly, the
spelling of local place names varies within the document, and often deviates from spelling conventions found on maps
or other documents on the Internet. Given that Uyghur place names are phonetically transliterated into Chinese, which
permits a range of possibilities, this indicates that the data was entered by a range of different local Uyghur government
staff.
When considering that it contains personal information for over 2,000 persons and possesses a considerable degree of
complexity, the Karakax List shows a high degree of internal consistency and data validity. Within the document, the
data in the first 10 columns pertaining to main persons appears to be overall more consistent and reliable than the data
in the 11 column.
2.0 Karakax County and its Re-Education Camps
2.1 General Overview
Karakax County is part of Hotan Prefecture. Both regions are predominantly Uyghur. In 2018, Hotan Prefecture had a
population of 2.53 million (2.45 million of them Uyghur).[6] Karakax County’s population stood at 646,202 in 2017, with
631,541 of them being Uyghur.[7] If assuming the same population growth rate as Hotan, the county’s 2018 head count
would be closer to about 633,000.
Karakax has 16 administrative units: four towns and 12 townships. All of them are found in the document as residence
locations, frequently with different or inconsistent spelling. The reason for this is again the fact that the local Uyghur
population, including the predominantly minority cadres, use different phonetic transliterations for what were originally
Uyghur names. Searches on the Chinese internet and Baidu Maps showed that the spelling variations contained in the
document are not uncommon.
2.2 Internment Facilities
The leaked document shows that all of the 311 main persons are or were in one of four re-education centers ( x
or ). Several of the other persons are also interned in these camps or in one of the county’s detention
centers. According to a Karakax government website dated May 2018, the county has a total of five re-education
centers.[8] This website uses the exact same abbreviations to describe their names and (abbreviated) locations, as well
as showing the vice heads of these centers. All five centers have the same naming convention and there is no indication
that their purpose differs. The author was able to identify three of the four centers mentioned in the document on satellite
imagery. All of them were constructed between 2014/15 and early 2018, most likely in late 2016 or early 2017.
th
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All three identified camps had their visible security features (tall razor wire fences around buildings and in courtyards,
watchtowers) removed in the first half of 2019, with two of them having these features removed between April and June
2019. With a massive 2,074sqm armed police base, a 2,771sqm canteen, and eight large main buildings, the no. 1
center appears to be the largest of these.
Center
number
1 2 3 4
Center
name
or
(more rarely spelled
), or 1
or
or
or
or
Center
location
(Bosidan Industrial
Park)
37°06’42.7″N
79°38’30.9″E
Exact location is
unclear
Karakax Vocational and
Technology Senior High
School (see Baidu and
Google Maps),
37°15’7.79″N79°43’19.88″E
Likely on or near the
grounds of the
(see
Baidu Maps),
37°15’33.88″N
79°44’52.93″E
Persons in
charge of
the center
( )
·
(Uyghur) and
(Han)
·
(Uyghur) and
·
(Uyghur)
· (Uyghur),
·
(Uyghur), ·
(Uyghur) and (Han)
·
(Uyghur), ·
(Uyghur),
· (Uyghur),
·
(Uyghur)
Visible
features on
Google
Earth
Camp and detention
center were
constructed
between 10/2014
and 1/2018. Tall
surrounding wall, tall
fences around
buildings and in
open spaces,
watchtowers.
Security features
were removed
between April 22,
2019 and June 21,
2019.
n/a Constructed between 7/2015
and 1/2018. Tall surrounding
wall, tall fences around
buildings and in open
spaces, watchtowers.
Security features were
removed between May 8,
2019 and June 21, 2019.
Constructed
between 6/2015 and
4/2018. Tall
surrounding wall, tall
fences around
buildings and in
open spaces,
watchtowers.
Security features
were removed
between January 28,
2019 and April 7,
2019.
Evidence Construction bid for Construction bid for
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from
construction
bids or
other
government
documents
the camp, featuring
8 buildings
(corresponds to
satellite images).[9]
Construction bid for
seven factories for
this center at a cost
of 81.2 million RMB,
+
1-7
[10]
Construction notice
for a 2,074sqm
armed police station
and a 2,771sqm
canteen in this
center.[11]
[12]
conversion of former
Vocational and Technology
Senior High School to an
educational correction
center:
( ), :
,
[13]
B
[14]
B
[15]
Construction notice
for re-education
poverty alleviation
workshops on the
grounds of the No. 2
Senior Middle
School:
+
, :
[16]
Table 2. Authentication of re-education camps in which main persons are interned. Source: Karakax List.
Large centers apparently consist of several “districts” ( ). This can refer to different areas on the same general
compound, as in the case of camp no. 4, which has an “A district” and a “B district” (A , B ). [17] Camp no. 1, the
largest of the three identified, apparently, has 12 districts ( 12 , row 12). This can be confirmed
from a county government financial document that outlines the issuance of new bonds to finance alterations on districts
1 to 12 of the camp no. 1, which is also referred to as the Karakax County Education and Training Center (
1–12 ). [18] Besides being located in specific
districts, re-education detainees can be very precisely identified through their district ( ), building ( ) and class ( ). For
example, the father of the main detainee in row 415 is shown to be in re-education in “district 12, building 6, class 18”
(12 6 18 ).
Conversely, “training centers” appear to be assigned to administrative districts ( ), and at least in Karakax, many of
them their own “training center”. Throughout the document, centers number 1 to 5 are also referred to as “no. x district
training center” ( x [ ] ). In the case of camp no. 2, the equivalence of “no. 2 training center” and “no. 2
district training center” is established in the document, since both terms are used in the same phrase and in relation to
the same re-education detainee ( elsewhere also called ).
Even a “no. 12 district training center” (12 ) is mentioned. Indeed, Karakax County has had 12 districts
for much of its recent history (1950 to 2014, coinciding with the number of its townships).[19] This naming convention is
therefore most likely different from the districts within individual camps (such as the district no. 12 in camp no. 1
mentioned above). The document specifically mentions “district camps” numbers 1 to 6, 10 and 12. If accurate, this
relationship between camps and administrative units would broadly confirm the author’s previous estimated that the total
number of re-education camps in Xinjiang is roughly commensurate to the number of its administrative units at township
and higher levels.
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According to government documents, the construction and operation of these re-education facilities became a grave
financial burden for the county. A county financial operation analysis report from April 2017, a time when many minorities
were being interned, notes a severe funding gap for a number of stability maintenance operations. Among them, the
“education and training centers’ were forecasted to cause a funding gap of 108.9 million RMB.[20] As a result, the
county dramatically increased the issuance of new bonds: from 187.4 million in 2016 to 532 million in 2017, of which
90 million were designated for re-education facility construction.[21]
In 2018, Karakax increased its bond issuance volume to a stunning 2.48 billion RMB.[22] Of the 25 projects that were
listed as part of this financing drive, eight were related to re-education camps. Specifically, the new debt was scheduled
to finance the expansion of re-education camps numbers one to four, along with the construction and expansion of
related factories and skills training bases. A county report dated January 26, 2019, provides a detailed discussion of the
contents and training goals of one of these re-education related factory construction projects. [23]
Satellite imagery from Karakax shows at least one massive and highly securitized factory compound, consisting of
several dozen blue-roofed, single-floor workshops.[24] Constructed between April and September 2018, this compound
measures approximately 325,000sqm, and features surrounding walls, tall razor wire fences around each single
individual building, and several watchtowers. Just north of this compound are large new residential areas that appear to
be part of a 380 million RMB poverty-alleviation employment and resettlement plan.[25]
The leaked document also notes at least two detention centers ( ) by name. The Bostan Industrial Park Detention
Center ( ) is located directly south of the no. 1 re-education camp, southeast of the industrial park
(37° 6’36.50″N 79°38’22.21″E). It originally consisted of two buildings built between 10/2014 and 1/2018. Between
04/2018 and 06/2019, eight detention center buildings were added, along with several other types of buildings on an
extended part of its compound.
The size of the county’s main and first detention center, the Moy County Detention Center ( ), is located at
37°16’36.48″N 79°44’46.52″E, and likewise increased dramatically. Construction of this facility started in late 2011 and
was completed by April 2013. Between 6/2015 and 9/2018, the land area covered by its buildings roughly tripled.
This massive expansion of detention centers indicates a dual-pronged approach as Beijing moves the internment
campaign into the next phase. While especially those in the VTICs are being “released” into forced labor, many others in
extrajudicial internment are being sentenced to long prison terms.
3.0 New Evidence on the Genesis of Chen Quanguo’s Internment Drive
By providing us with detailed reasons for internment and subsequent verdicts for release or continued “study”, the
Karakax List sheds new light on the internal and administrative dynamics behind the internment campaign. Specifically,
there is a strong overlap between the data and decision-making processes behind internment and verdicts, and the
investigative tasks and categories of the so-called village-based work teams ( ). This section seeks to shed
new light on both the ideological and administrative processes that led up to the internment campaign, culminating in a
more detailed explanation of the genesis and timing of the re-education drive overseen by Chen Quanguo during his first
seven months in the region.
3.1 “Educational Guidance must be Tough”: The Inception of Re-Education to Combat “Expressions of
Religious Extremism”
In May 2013, the XUAR released a document titled “Autonomous Region Party Committee document no. 11” (
11 ).[26] This document sought to distinguish between “legitimate” and “extremist” expressions of religion. It is
widely cited in the context of the early stages of the crackdown on so-called Uyghur separatism and the related strike
hard and re-education campaigns.
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Most notably, this document emphasizes that “the hand that strikes hard must be tough, [and] the hand that [provides]
educational guidance must [also] be tough” ( ). The timing of this statement
closely corresponds to the earliest mention of “transformation through education” in the context of Xinjiang’s de-
extremification (August 2013), exactly one year before the progressive institutionalization of re-education both in terms of
administrative structures and dedicated transformation through education facilities.[27] Several sources confirm the close
connection between document no. 11 and the onset of the initial phase of the re-education drive. A January 2014
government report from Tekes County mentions “transformation through education” in the same sentence as that
document, denoting re-education as one of the means through which its directives are to be implemented.[28] Similarly,
a December 2014 article combines a discussion of document no. 11 with a visit to one of the earliest dedicated re-
education camps, the Kargilik County Transformation Through Education Center ( ).[29] Finally, one of
the most comprehensive reports on pre-2017 re-education work, a January 2015 state media article on Yining County,
cites document no. 11’s statement about educational guidance having to be tough in the very first sentence.[30]
In order to “control the expressions of religious extremism”, the document no. 11 proposed “three simultaneous
approaches”, consisting of establishing positive beliefs towards the Party ( ), a confrontation (of “extremist
beliefs”) with modern culture ( ), and regulating (wrong beliefs) with the rule of law ( ).[31] It further
stated that “the infected minority masses” should, through educational guidance, be led in the direction of secularization
and a modern lifestyle. The latter is precisely what the re-education camps have been implementing, and certainly with a
“tough hand”.
Overall, it is clear that document no. 11 played a major role in laying the ideological and administrative foundation for the
evolving re-education drive. It bluntly advocates an intrusive and heavy-handed sociocultural re-engineering approach
that is predicated upon “tough educational guidance” designed to promote secularization and weed out religious
customs, practices and beliefs. Essentially, Chen Quanguo’s internment campaign took these directives and
systematically implemented them throughout the entire region.
3.2 “Visit the People”: The Crucial Role of Village-Based Work Teams in Identifying Persons for Re-
Education Internment
In February 2014, Xinjiang’s Party secretary Zhang Chunxian initiated a campaign to send 200,000 cadres into rural
minority regions for the three years of 2014 to 2016.[32] This campaign was titled “Visit the People, Benefit the People,
and Bring Together the Hearts of the People” (fang minqing, hui minsheng, ju minxin, ),
abbreviated as fanghuiju ( ).[33] This village-based work team strategy sought to penetrate deeply into Uyghur
communities and homes, making cadres live, work and eat with the people, with the primary aim of gathering
intelligence. The campaign was to achieve complete coverage, “leaving no blank spaces”.[34] Together with other
government documents, the Karakax List testifies to the fact that this campaign has and continues to form the backbone
of the concurrent re-education drive, even more than previously thought.
Notably, Zhang Chunxian’s campaign was not novel. It was Chen Quanguo who in November 2011 during his rule in the
Tibet Autonomous Region initiated a massive drive of sending 100,000 cadres in village-based work teams to Tibetan
villages.[35] For Chen, these “village-based work teams” ( ) represented a key pillar of his government’s
stability maintenance work, in addition to administrative and technological innovations such as mass surveillance
systems or grid management. The work of these teams was extremely intrusive in nature, seeking to obtain personal
information from Tibetan villagers that could be used to report on them.[36] Perhaps in order to confirm his original
authorship of this initiative, the phrase “village-based work team” ( ) was added to fanghuiju as soon as Chen
took over from Zhang.
When Chen Quanguo replaced Zhang Chunxian as Xinjiang’s Party secretary, the 3-year campaign was almost
completed, and valuable lessons had been learned from it. Chen immediately placed a special emphasis on the village-
based work teams, featuring them and their importance in the very first section of his speech on October 29, 2016.[37]
When the village-based work team campaign was re-launched in 2017, it came with a mandate of special urgency. The
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campaign was to achieve a “standardization, scientific-ization, institutionalization, and normalization of fanghuiju village
work”.[38] The teams represented not only the essence of grassroots work, but also a long-term mechanism for
penetrating and permeating the grassroots.
3.3 Village-Based Work Teams and the Sequence of Events Leading up to the Internment Campaign
Importantly, the timing of the village-based work teams could have played a decisive role in the timing of the mass
internment drive. Chen Quanguo was likely brought to Xinjiang in August 2016 so that he could spend the first 6 to 7
months on a massive securitization drive, involving mass recruitments of police forces, constructing thousands of new
police stations and checkpoints, and installing large-scale surveillance systems. The establishment of this security
infrastructure would have been a first move in order to prevent any possibility of public unrest resulting from the mass
internments.
Meanwhile, Chen began to adapt and prepare the village-based work team campaign for the upcoming internment
drive. In a November 16, 2016 speech, he made 10 new demands for this work. Rather than pointing to innovation,
these demands reflected a planned evolution of the work team campaign, focusing on their work focus, effectiveness,
complete coverage and iron-fisted discipline.[39] This culminated in the development of a regionwide new village-based
work teams plan (2017 “ ” ). Again, rather than featuring significant new
contents, this plan primarily focused on the urgency and overarching importance of the teams’ work for maintaining
social stability and penetrating grassroots work.[40] In a widely cited January 7 speech that was broadcast on television
and listened to by all stability maintenance-related government work units (including the village-based work teams), Chen
focused on the subject of Party discipline, emphasizing the need to “strictly manage the Party [using] iron-like discipline”.
[41] The speech reiterated the need to conduct “penetrating fanghuiju village-based team work”, and echoed Xi Jinping’s
words from 2014 that the region was to “deploy a net from heaven to earth [and] building copper wall and iron walls” (
).[42] Again, Chen’s main focus was on preparing his ranks for the tough-minded, military-
style investigative and internment operations that were to follow. On January 20, the region then launched a new
“fanghuiju village-based work team management information system”, a “quantitative analysis tool to undertake statistical
analyses of the situation of villagers and villages” ( ). [43]
The launch date of the internment drive was likely not just dependent on the time needed for Chen to adjust to his new
job, gain control over the state apparatus and securitize the region. Village-based work teams had established time
windows for their annual re-launch (Table 3). The teams were formally sent-off with a regionwide ceremony and had set
dates by which they had to be fully deployed. Aside from a minor deviation in 2016, these dates were in early March.
For 2017, work teams were for the first time ordered not to leave during Chinese New Year. They were required to
maintain a skeleton team presence through February 1 , with full team deployment to be completed by March 1 .[44]
The internment campaign received a quasilegal backing with the issuing of the “de-extremification ordinance” on March
30. All other evidence, including the internment dates contained in the Karakax List, indicate that the campaign started in
early April 2017 (see section 4.2.2).
Year Chinese New Year holiday period Dates of team send-off day / full deployment
deadline
2014 Jan 31 – Feb 6 Feb 14 / March 5
2015 Feb 19 – 24 Jan 15 / March 1
2016 Feb 8 – 13 Feb 24 / Feb 25
2017 Jan 28 – Feb 2 Feb 25 / March 1
Table 3. Sources for send-off and deployment dates: 2014: http://archive.is/wip/3g88K (compare
http://archive.is/wip/7rNbw), 2015: http://archive.is/wip/DcBRp and http://archive.is/wip/ry5s3 (compare
st st
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http://archive.is/wip/cuQYg and http://www.xjgdj.gov.cn/2015/03/07/zysx/2202.html), 2016:
http://archive.is/wip/56o6t and http://archive.is/wip/NkuTZ (compare http://archive.is/wip/hgW9K), 2017:
http://archive.is/wip/73fke and http://archive.is/jDaPa.
This sequence of events also indicates that Zhang Chunxian’s rule in Xinjiang was almost certainly cut short, so that
Chen Quanguo could be installed in time to oversee what must be considered a premeditated internment campaign.
Zhang’s signature campaign, the fanghuiju, was designed to finish in late 2016 with a general evaluation. Instead, this
evaluation was overseen by Chen, more than likely in order to give him an opportunity to become acquainted with this
work in Xinjiang, and to adapt it for the subsequent re-education drive. Chen Quanguo, Zhang Chunxian and Xi Jinping
were all in the same place during the Two Sessions in Beijing in March that year, making it possible that detailed plans
for Xinjiang’s internment campaign and related governance changes were made at that time.
3.4 “Digging Behind the Curtain”: The Investigative Mission of Village-based Work Teams
On February 2, 2017, approximately eight weeks before the onset of the massive internment campaign, the Hotan
Prefecture Fanghuiju Village-Based Work Team Leadership Small Group Office ( “ ”
) issued a set of work instructions from the prefecture’s Party secretary.[45] The document obtained by the author
was stored in the file cache of the Töwet (Tuowaite) Township Fanghuiju village-based work group, which is in Karakax
County. Each cadre, village police officer and village-based work team member was to be responsible for 40
households, ensuring full coverage by “spreading pressure” and roping in existing local arrangements such as
neighborhood watch systems and linked household groups (a mechanism by which 10 households were mutually
responsible for supervising and reporting on each other). Their work principle was to “go out in the morning to work,
focus on visiting homes, and collect and evaluate work [results] in the evenings”.
More specifically, the teams were to adopt a strategy of employing nine different investigative techniques ( )
and then to hold daily evaluation meetings where they would discuss the results of their “excavation work” ( ).
The header for this section was titled: “Implement the overall goal, dig behind the curtain, shovel the soil” (
). It continued by mandating the establishment of a cohort ( ) dedicated to “dig the stock, reduce
the amount, shovel the soil” ( ), or short: “dig, reduce, shovel” ( ). The “dig, reduce,
shovel” motto was initiated by Chen Quanguo during his crucial October 29, 2016, speech, where he advocated it in
the context of establishing a “fine-grained strike-hard” approach.[46] This phrase refers to three aspects: a) to dig out
and hence uncover the problem persons (“terrorists” and their helpers); b) to reduce their numbers; and c) to shovel
away the soil where they can grow, flourish or hide.
This concept coined by Chen was arguably, again, an evolution rather than an innovation. In January 2015, Zhang
Chunxian had coined the phrase “remove the cover, dig behind the curtain” ( ), or short: “uncover and
dig” ( ), as a vivid metaphor for uncovering the places of hiding and influence of extremist elements in the context of
the “strike hard campaign” ( ).[47] A 2016 Hotan Prefecture spreadsheet designed to record the
activities of village-based work teams (in this case for Karakax’s Töwet Township) featured a column where works teams
have to enter how many times they “accompanied the ‘remove the cover, dig behind the curtain’ work” ( ”
” ).[48]
Under Chen, both concepts came to be used in tandem. For example, a village-based work team report from July 2017
from Pishan County speaks of an “ ‘uncover and dig’ and ‘dig, reduce, shovel’ special activity” (“ ”“ ” )
in the context of investigating two particular problem groups: so-called “untrustworthy persons” ( ), and
persons from the village who could not be accounted for.[49]
Crucially, both of the terms “uncover and dig” and “dig, reduce, shovel” are directly associated with the investigative
methods of the village-based work teams and how these methods dramatically contributed to the mass internment
campaign, especially in the first half of 2017. Here are four pertinent examples.
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1. the village work team in Toghraqbostan ( ) village in Township, Lop County,
Hotan Prefecture, states that “based on notifications from higher [state] levels and the village-based work team’s
‘uncover and dig’ efforts, the number of strike-hard detainees rose from 6 at the beginning of the year [2017] to
now 16, and the number of persons in education and training increased from 6 to 21”.[50] The village had 154
households.
2. A very similar report from Qedirdan ( ) village in the same township, dated March 2017, says that
“since the start of the ‘dig, reduce, shovel’ [campaign], up until now, 23 persons were detained and sentenced,
and 19 persons [placed into] transformation through education”.[51]
3. 2017 Hotan CPC District Committee work report noted that as part of the “’uncover and dig’” initiative, 179
persons had been detained and 163 persons “sent to transformation through education training.”[52]
4. A June 2017 report from the Uqturpan (Wushen) County Forestry Department Village Work Team noted that
“through information evaluation meetings, 54 untrustworthy persons had been sent to the legal system school to
study”.[53] These meetings are part of the investigative mechanism called for by these “dig” and “uncover”
campaigns.
In tandem with village-based work teams, the “the dig, reduce, shovel” campaign was instrumental in the internment
campaign. A document issued by the Arslan Bagh ( ) Township government notes that this campaign is,
along with other measures, being used to “cut off the extreme religious thought inheritance system and eradicate the …
transmission channels of religious extreme thought” (
).[54]
Notably, the “dig, reduce, shovel” concept features prominently in one of the leaked documents from the China Cables:
bulletin no. 20, which features a report titled “Integrated Joint Operation Platform [IJOP] Daily Clues Report”.[55] In this
document, these clues are referred to as “dig, reduce, shovel clues”.
The relationship between the village-based work teams and the IJOP is evidently circular:
Through the IJOP app ( APP) and other local reporting mechanisms, the teams, along with local cadres and
government staff, feed the integrated big data platform with meticulous details about households and individuals
based on their home stays and visits.
The IJOP combines all data from all sources, including police and surveillance data, and then flags anything that is
deemed suspicious and warrants further investigation.[56]
Besides local cadres and police, it is often the work teams who are then charged with investigating whatever the
IJOP flagged, included so-called “persons recommended to be sent [to re-education] by the integrated platform”
( , or short: ).
Specifically, work directives for these teams mandate that they must “undertake an on-the-ground investigation of micro
clues [ ] that were pushed [by the IJOP].”[57]
Together with the local authorities, village-based work teams are also responsible for comprehensive analysis of the
evidence that they gather. All four examples mentioned above of the teams boosting the ranks of those sent to re-
education mention information evaluation meetings ( ) in more or less direct conjunction with sending
persons to re-education.
After long days filled with home visits, the teams are then required to hold daily “evening evaluation meetings” (
), during which they examine the information that was gathered, evaluate whether it may contain elements of
suspicion, and note the results in a report. An overview of work team duties from Hotan County notes that the evening
meetings consider a range of information, including household data, their “actual behavior”, and other collected
materials.[58] An example of such a report comes from Töwet Village in Karakax’s Töwet Township. Dated March 1,
2017, the report notes that the village has many persons who illegally crossed the border into other countries, including
many who are now stranded overseas and have not returned ( ). [59] The report
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further speculates that there is a risk that those persons abroad may be secretly collaborating with local villagers to
commit crimes. The region is considered to have a “dense religious atmosphere” ( ), and its location at a
road junction, with related uncontrolled comings and goings, is noted to be of particular concern. Indeed, both a range
of other, related documents as well as the Karakax List indicate that those two areas of concern played a crucial role in
designating persons for re-education internment.
3.4 “Trustworthy” or “Untrustworthy”? The Investigative Categories of Village-Based Work Teams
There is a strong correlation between the terminology of reasons for internment found in the Karakax List and the
investigative categories given to the work teams. A spreadsheet completed by the Yéngi Awat ( ) township in
Yarkand (Shache) County, Kashgar Prefecture, features a tab with a heading titled “remove the cover, eliminate the nest,
dig behind the curtain activity survey results summary table” (“ ” ).[60]
This table (Figure 3) contains a detailed list of types of potentially suspicious or dangerous persons, including: religious
figures ( ); persons with no official religious duties who possess religious knowledge (
); persons who went on a Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca) – either in general, or in the form of a “scattered Hajj” (not as part
of a government-approved tour group) ([ ] ); persons who have been through re-education (
); men who in the past had long beards ( ); women who in the past wore veils (
); persons who work long-term outside their home region ( ); persons who sold their property and
left [the region] ( ); persons whose whereabouts are unknown ( ); and the arbitrary
catch-all category of “persons in need of re-education” ( ). From the Karakax List, witness statement,
and other documents, it is evident that these groups of persons were then prominently targeted for internment. Evidence
for the link between the “dig, reduce, shovel” and the “remove and dig” campaigns, village-based work teams, and
investigative categories such as “untrustworthy” or “focus” persons can also be found in numerous other sources and
government websites.[61]
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This investigative spreadsheet also indicates that the work teams were expected to proceed in a very systematic
fashion. In one tab, they had to compile a detailed record of the religious situation in the village. This included the
number of places of worship, number of religious books, and many of the types of persons mentioned above (Hajj,
religious knowledge, etc.), including women who wash their bodies according to religious rites. In a second tab, work
teams were to record demographic details, with a special focus on age groups that were a special target of the re-
education campaign (Figure 4). Specifically, persons were to be categorized according to decade in which they were
born, such as “80s and after” (80 ), “90s and after”(90 ), and “2000s and after” (00 ), separated by gender. All
three of these demographic designations are found in the Karakax List as reasons for being sent to re-education. Finally,
a third tab (Figure 4) was to be used to categorize persons as either “focus persons” ( ), “average persons” (
) or “trustworthy persons” ( ). This scheme existed prior to Chen Quanguo and is for example mentioned in a
Karakax County village-based work team document from March 30, 2016, where teams are exhorted to categorize local
households according to a four-fold scheme: two different types of “focus households” ( or ),
“basic [average] households” ( ) and “trustworthy households” ( ). [62]
Figure 3. The “remove the cover, eliminate the nest, dig behind the curtain
activity survey results summary table” for village-based work teams. Source:
Source reference code: 34912.
—
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These categorization schemes are of particular importance for understanding the dynamics of the internment campaign.
Prior to the onset of Chen’s massive internment campaign, they focused on identifying “strike-hard detainees” along with
persons to be subjected to in-situ ideological (re-) education measures. As the internment campaign unfolded,
especially the softer “untrustworthy” category became a prominent tool for identifying re-education internment targets.
[63] While this designation had previously often (though not always) been more of a general category that could
encompass other problem groups, its use under Chen became more specific for identifying soft re-education (versus
“strike-hard”) targets.[64] This is also how the term is ubiquitously used in the Karakax List.
Under Chen, the division of villages, households or persons during the course of the mass internment campaign
involves up to four different categories. The most comprehensive scheme appears to involve four of them. The two
problem categories are “focus persons” ( ) and “untrustworthy persons” ( ), frequently also involving
a third problem category of “special groups” ( ).[65] These stand in contrast to “average persons” ( )
and “trustworthy persons” ( ). [66] This classification scheme also has consequences for how work team visits
must be conducted. Focus persons and untrustworthy persons require that work teams are accompanied by police
Figure 4a. Persons categorized by perceived threat level and
by the decade in which they were born. Source: Source
reference code: 34912.
—
Figure 4b. Persons categorized by perceived threat
level and by the decade in which they were born.
Source: Source reference code: 34912.
—
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forces, and they are visited by a larger team of 7-8 persons. In contrast, the other two types of households do not
require any police accompaniment and are visited by teams composed of 4-5 persons.[67] A Yarkand (Shache) County
handbook for establishing regular village work mandates that wireless video surveillance systems must not only be
placed at key locations and road intersections, but also near the homes of “untrustworthy persons”.[68]
Specifically, “focus persons” appear to be more likely to end up in detention (and ultimately, imprisonment), whereas
“untrustworthy persons” appear to be mainly sent to re-education facilities (if they are not kept under local community
control). This is confirmed by two of the reports cited in section 3.3. Both the Uqturpan (Wushen) County Forestry
Department Village Work Team report and the 2017 Hotan CPC District Committee work report state that
“untrustworthy” persons were sent to re-education facilities, whereas “members of terrorist groups and focus persons”
were sent to detention facilities.[69] This distinction is also supported by other documents. For example, the 2018
Qargilik (Ruoqiang) County Justice System budget report states that “untrustworthy persons” are placed into social
correction and drug rehabilitation centers ( ), alongside drug addicts and mentally ill persons, where
they receive a “new life” through “psychological rehabilitation, behavioral correction, and a reconfiguration of their value
systems” ( ).[70] This represents a form of extrajudicial internment, akin to re-
education, and not formal imprisonment. Finally, a spreadsheet from Kawak ( ) Township in the northern part of
Karakax County that lists 1,249 persons in detention and re-education shows that 93.2 percent of persons who are
classified as “untrustworthy” are either in detention or re-education.[71]
3.5 “Untrustworthy Persons” in the Karakax List
In the Karakax List, of 484 persons who are shown to be in re-education along with a specific reason, 116 (24.0
percent) were explicitly categorized as “untrustworthy person”, although it seems likely that this designation was not
applied consistently. Of these 116, a total of 88 had this as the effectively only reason for internment, at times with minor
elaborations, but not categorized for other main reasons. In contrast, only three of the 484 were labeled as “focus
persons”.
Most commonly, “untrustworthy persons” were simply described as a general demographic category, following the “born
after decade xy” scheme discussed above. Of the 116 persons with this designation, 98 followed such a demographic
scheme. At other times, “untrustworthy persons” were simply deemed suspicious by association, for example by being
part of the same family network as another person in detention. Others were classified as “untrustworthy” because they
work outside of Karakax and only infrequently return home. Others had exceeded the official birth quotas or not allowed
the three-year minimum time period between births. Yet another was said to “not go along with community work”, such
as failing to attend the flag raising ceremony, while yet another was simply characterized as being “disassociated from
society” ( ).
“Untrustworthiness” represents a general category of suspicion that is hard to grasp. It represents persons whom the
state feels cannot be as easily understood or controlled as it wants them to be. A pertinent example is a “born in the 80s
or after untrustworthy person” who has extensive business dealings outside the region. The “reason for re-education”
states that this person has “relatively complicated interactions and activity trajectories”, and their whereabouts are “not
easily grasped”. Several other cases in the leaked document give similar reasons for internment without designating
those persons as “untrustworthy”, indicating that the category was not necessarily consistently applied, but often rather
used as a catch-all reason for internment where little or no other real evidence existed. A particular pertinent example for
this can be found in the release verdict text of an “untrustworthy person born in the 90s”. [72] Besides that designation,
no other reasons for internment are given. The verdict simply states that “this person does not have [any] extreme
religious thinking”, a blatant admission that is consistent with the generic and essentially totally arbitrary nature of the
“untrustworthy” designation.
Consequently, “untrustworthiness” is the perhaps most pertinent mark of Chen Quanguo’s mass internment campaign,
which, in contrast to his predecessor, aimed to deal with those hard-to-control population groups that were not easily
amenable to criminal conviction, nor secular or steady enough to be considered “trustworthy”. The use of this catch-all
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category allowed the state to designate entire demographic groups as potentially suspicious, and hence liable for the
“preventative treatment” of “transformation through education”.
3.6 Conclusions: Chen the Upscaler
The evidence presented in this section points to several new conclusions regarding the inception and unfolding of
Xinjiang’s campaign of mass internment.
First, it appears to be increasingly clear that Chen Quanguo’s role in Xinjiang’s mass internment drive was less one of
innovation than of execution. His main role was to adjust, optimize and especially upscale existing frameworks and
mechanisms. In August 2016, Xinjiang already had an increasingly well-developed re-education framework: re-education
procedures, mechanisms for identifying persons to be sent to re-education, and a system of dedicated (three-tiered)
related institutions all existed.
Second, the internment campaign and the related replacement of Zhang with Chen was almost certainly premeditated. It
must have been planned by a group of people, likely involving Zhang, Chen, and high-level central government figures.
At least some of the face-to-face meetings may have taken place during the Two Sessions in March 2016 in Beijing. It is
unclear who first thought of the mass internment campaign. It might have been Chen, based on resulting long-term
outcome requirements set by Beijing. Two things, however, are clear. The overall implementation of this campaign
involved the central government, at some point almost certainly Xi Jinping himself. And, when Chen assumed his new
post in Xinjiang in late August 2016, he executed a premeditated plan. He immediately unfurled a rapid series of drastic
and large-scale measures, knowing that he only had about seven months.
Chen first set up the security infrastructure (surveillance and police) in case the internment drive would create massive
upheavals, and also to increase the flow of surveillance data that could be used for internment decisions. Secondly, he
prepared and then re-launched the village-based work team campaign, which formed the groundwork for local
internment decisions. Thirdly, he promoted a taught disciplinary spirit among the cadres, preparing them for what was to
come. Even so, some of them later resisted the mass internment, and Yarkand County’s Party secretary Wang Yongzhi
even released thousands of detainees.[73] Fourthly, he set the stage for a dramatic expansion of preschool education
and boarding facilities, knowing that hundreds of thousands of parents would be interned. Finally, Chen oversaw the
construction of a vast array of new internment facilities, evidently a highly secret campaign for which we have almost no
data. A handful of public construction bids, analyzed by the author in his 2018 research paper, indicate that most of
these notices were issued from March 2017 onwards, with a peak in June that year.[74]
None of these campaigns represented in and of themselves drastic innovations. What united them all was that they
were executed with the same military-style drivenness and relentless precision.
Given all this, Chen was clearly the ideal man for the job. He not only possessed the experience with cutting edge
police and surveillance mechanisms and technologies. He also had that uncompromising, intense drivenness and stern,
military-like discipline required to upscale existing systems and mechanisms within extremely short time periods, creating
vast new realities before the world even knew what was going on. Perhaps most importantly, Chen knew how to rule
and manage less-than-disciplined minority cadres with an iron grip. He was familiar with innovation, but in Xinjiang he did
not get caught up in experimenting with the new. Rather, he oversaw what we might liken to a wartime army-style
operation, the mobilization of all levers of government, enabled by a shear limitless authority over human beings and
unprecedentedly large financial budgets.
4.0 The Karakax List: Analysis and Authentication
4.1 Verifying the Identity of Individuals
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For the purpose of verifying the personal identities of those listed in the document, the author benefited from being in
possession of a local government cache of over 25,000 files. Some of these data sets come directly from locations in
Karakax County. Many of these files contain spreadsheets with long lists of local citizens, and they feature detailed
personal information.
The author recursively parsed these documents with a command line script, resulting in a list of 2.9 million unique ID
numbers of persons from Xinjiang (ID numbers that start with the two digits ‘65’). Of these, 1.16 million are from Hotan
Prefecture (ID numbers with the first four digits ‘6532’), and 255,189 from Karakax County (ID numbers with the first six
digits ‘653222’). Of these, 321 could be matched with IDs from the leaked documents.
In addition, the author was able to obtain a list of ID numbers from persons in Xinjiang from an anonymous source in The
Netherlands. This list derived from an unsecured online database of SenseNets, a Shenzhen facial recognition company
that processes surveillance data.[75] The entire SenseNets database reportedly contained the identities of 2.5 million
persons from Xinjiang. The list obtained by the author contains the ID numbers and names of 725,804 persons. Of
these, 725,499 are from Xinjiang, 498,725 are from Hotan Prefecture, and 28,117 are specifically from Karakax County.
A total of 33 IDs could be matched with IDs from the leaked document, of which nine had already been matched
through the cache of local documents.
Finally, the author identified 577,413 ID numbers from persons in Xinjiang from documents, spreadsheets and web
pages from a range of Xinjiang government websites. Of these, 58,158 are from Hotan Prefecture, and 31,843 are
specifically from Karakax County. Five of them could be matched with IDs from the leaked document, with one of them
having already been matched through the cache of local documents.
The personal identities of these 349 matching IDs were further verified by comparing names, and, where applicable,
addresses and other personal details such as current education or employment with the other source documents.
Additionally, the general validity (internal consistency) of each ID number was verified by running it through a Chinese ID
verification website.[76] This resulted in a final count of 337 successfully matched and 12 unsuccessfully matched
identities.
The matching process faced several challenges. Firstly, they arose from the fact that places of residence and
occupation are subject to changes as the government requires persons to: relocate, enter training with the aim of
changing occupation, intern, or be released from internment into old or new places of residence and employment. Since
the secondary documents used to corroborate the Karakax Spreadsheet were published at different times (mostly 2017
or 2018), this issue was all the more pertinent.
Secondly, name inconsistencies are frequent. Since Uyghur personal and place names are phonetically transliterated in
Chinese, there can be considerable, legitimate spelling variations. In addition, Uyghur names are often localized
variations of Arabic names such as Mohammed, which means that names can have longer or shorter variants (e.g.
Memet / Memetqurban), intimate or more formal variants (e.g. Turdush / Turdi), or other slight variations (e.g. Kerim /
Abdukerim). In addition, incorrect names associated with ID numbers appear to be a recurring issue in local government
documents. Such files also on occasion list the wrong gender of a person, contradicting the gender indicated by both
name and ID number. This is all very likely a result of human error due to the immensely high reporting requirements and
other stress factors that local government staff face.
The minimum matching requirements for the purpose of this research were as follows:
Residence and/or occupation can differ, but ID number and name must be identical
If either first or last names differ, then ID number, the other name part, and either residence or occupation must
match.
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These matching criteria resulted in the exclusion of 12 matches from the list, resulting in a final number of 337
successfully matched identities.
The author identified a number of other data issues that are likewise attributable to human error. Of the 1,815 ID
numbers contained in the document, 29 have an incorrect length: two have 16 digits, 16 have 17 digits, and 11 have
19 digits. This represents an error rate of 1.6 percent. Notably, all of these numbers are found in the middle column
(family and social circles), with none of them pertaining to the 311 main persons. Generally, it appears that this column
contains more human errors than the other (and especially the main) data columns. The omission or addition of a final
number in an 18-digit number sequence is clearly attributable to human error, resulting from manual entry. In all of these
cases, the date of birth digits were valid. For six of the 19-digit ID numbers, the error stemmed from adding an extra
digit. Omitting the 19 digit resulted in a valid ID number (per checksum verification).[77] In the other five cases, the 18
(checksum) digit was also incorrect.
Then, on two occasions two different identities were associated with the same ID number. One ID occurred five times in
the document and was associated four times with one identity (name / residence / occupation), each as a “neighbor” in
the context of the same main person, and once with another identity and as part of the social circle of a different main
person. Consequently, the source of this error is apparently a mix-up between different datasets associated with
different re-education detainees. Another ID was associated six times with one identity, and three times with another.
The root issue was identical with the previous case: the identity that occurred six times was the main person himself,
while the one that occurred three times was the father of a (different) main person. A possible explanation for these
errors is, again, that the main row data appears to be more accurate and reliable than the data for family and social
circles.
Other instances where information for the same person differs between data rows can be explained by the chronological
sequence of the data, meaning for example that a person who is shown to be interned in one data row is said to have
been released in another.
Another apparent (but likely not real) discrepancy arises from the fact that a person may be shown to have been interned
on a certain date when listed as the family member of a main person, but show a different internment date in his/her
own main data row. In addition, main persons can have different internment camp names or numbers in different rows.
Both of these issues can be explained by the fact that interned persons may be transferred between camps and hence
have different (new) internment dates or camp designations.
These findings have significant implications for the authenticity of the document. If a person were to create a fake
document solely based on knowledge of the components of Chinese ID numbers, meaning they would compute a
random set of valid ID numbers for Karakax County, their chance of creating 337 ID numbers that actually matched
those of real persons can be computed as follows. There would be 11.12 million valid ID number combinations: 33,480
(valid date of births for ages 0 to 90) x 2 (gender) x 166 (sequential code, represented by digits 15 to 17).[78] Given that
the Uyghur population of Karakax in 2017 stood at 631,541, that means that it takes 17.6 attempts to generate a
number that matches that of a real person. The result of the probability (p) of someone doing this 337 times is
infinitesimal:
p=(631,541 / 11,115,360) ^ 337 = 4.086e-420
Therefore, the creation of the Karakax List with fake or invented data would only have been possible if that person had
access to a sufficient number of real ID numbers. In addition, this person would have needed considerable insider
knowledge of the terminology and the policy procedures of the internment campaign. It is far more probable that the
data is real.
4.2 Analysis of the Interned Persons Sample
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4.2.1 Demographic Composition
The author compiled a spreadsheet of all identities who were either main persons or shown as “interned for re-
education” ( etc.) elsewhere in the document. This resulted in a sheet containing 484 unique identities: 311 main
persons and 173 other persons in re-education.
Figure 5 shows the demographic composition of all of these 484 persons. This distribution is very similar to the author’s
previous research findings.[79] Compared to the 2010 census, the age cohorts between age 25 and 49 years are
overrepresented, indicating that these age groups have been particularly targeted. Interestingly, this age range exceeds
that of the generic demographic categories of “untrustworthy persons”, which starts at “born after the 80s”, and therefore
spans between the adult ages of 18 and 39 (when taking 2019 as the benchmark year). Compared to that range, the
main age range of those interned as per the Karakax List is almost exactly 10 years higher (25 to 49 years versus 18 to
39 years). The author’s previous work noted that many interned persons are household heads, or generally those with
influence in family and society. [80] The analysis below shows that reasons for internment vary with age cohort.
As in previous internment samples analyzed by the author, this sample is again predominantly male. Males made up
90.7 percent of interned main persons, and 90.0 percent of all interned persons.
4.2.2 The Chronology of Internment
Of the 484 persons shown as interned for re-education, 320 entries showed the dates of their internment. The results
(Figure 6) strongly correlate with previous research findings that suggest that the internment campaign started in late
March and early April 2017. Nearly half (44.1 percent) were interned in the three months of April, May, and June 2017.
About two-thirds (67.2 percent) were interned in 2017, and about one-third in 2018, largely due to a peak internment
intake in May 2018. Bulletin no. 14 of the China Cables noted that in the week from June 19 to 25, 2017, 15,683
“suspicious persons” in four minority population dominated regions in southern Xinjiang were interned as a result of IJOP
notifications. The Karakax List would indicate that this period was indeed a peak season of internment (and therefore
likely not representative of subsequent time periods).[81]
Figure 5. Source: Karakax List.—
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The second peak of internments between March and June 2018, during which 26.6 percent of all internments in the
document took place, is potentially related to another round of village-based work teams in the spring of that year. It also
coincides with a drastic increase in the floor spaces of several existing re-education facilities.[82]
This means that nearly all would have completed at least one year of internment by late June 2019, the latest possible
leak date of the document, and when three camps identified on satellite imagery had removed most or all of their
security features.
4.2.3 Reasons for Internment
After evaluating all relevant data rows, only 12 of the 484 re-education persons had no recorded reason for their
internment. The reasons for the other 472 identities were coded into eight categories. The coding was not mutually
exclusive, but one set of reasons could in theory result in an assignment in all eight coding categories. The coding
category “link to anything ‘abroad’” includes: applied for a passport but never left, left the country and returned, was in
contact with persons abroad, or has family members or relatives abroad.
The results are presented in figure 7. No single coding category was dominant, even though violations of birth control
policies constituted the most commonly cited reason for re-education, often along with other (typically religion-related)
reasons.
Figure 6. Source: Karakax List.—
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The fact that not one single category dominates the field can be explained by the preventative nature of re-education.
Re-education focuses on persons whom the government deems to be of risk. They may have committed so-called
“minor crimes” in the sense of behaviors that, according to the state, will likely develop into more serious issues, or
indicate that a person may be susceptible to temptation to delve deeper into “religious extremism”. Overall, this
perceived risk largely derives from what the state considers to be unknown factors: persons who are somewhat
“religious” and therefore might become more religious, persons who live in families where members have been detained
or convicted of crimes, or persons who associate with potentially “dangerous” or “suspicious’” people. Again, those with
connections abroad are also classified as “risk” persons, firstly because of the potential presence of religious extremism,
but more generally because those who live abroad are simply much harder to control.
Ultimately, the Karakax List demonstrates the extent to which Xinjiang’s re-education internment drive is a campaign to
eliminate risk by achieving complete state control over individuals, families, communities, and regions. The state’s main
mechanism for this is guilt by association.
Beijing has justified this campaign by arguing that those in the camps have committed “minor” or what we might term
pre-crimes: persons who are on the verge of slipping into much more dangerous territory. The data from the leaked
document soundly disproves these claims. The listed reasons for internment range from vagueness such as
“untrustworthy person born in a certain decade”, to someone with a “minor religious infection” (
), or those who “by clicking on a website unintentionally landed on a foreign website” (
). Others were interned because their “thinking is hard to grasp” ( ), they had a “complicated network
of relationships” ( ), “petition other persons without reasons” ( ), is “disassociated
from society” ( ), “applied for a passport but did not actually leave the country” ( ), merely
has “relatives abroad” ( ), only “suspected of having watched downloaded terrorist or other religious extremist
videos” ( ), has “talked to persons overseas” (
), used to wear a veil many years ago (such as e.g. from 2012 to 2014), used to grow a long beard years ago (in one
instance between 2010 and 2014), used a phone with a number that is not registered to the person’s name, or merely
“communicated with a detained person”. Often, these little “sins” are lumped together to justify internment. For example,
a person may have traveled overseas and used to grow a beard.
Figure 7. Source: Karakax List.—
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Notably, one of the state’s strategies is to dig up the “sins” of the past. Those who used to veil or grow beards years
before their internment did engage in a “religious” practice and are hence deemed more easily infectible by the “virus” of
“religion”. But this method of the state likely has another purpose: it communicates to the victims of what anthropologists
and Xinjiang academics Darren Byler and Joanne Smith Finley term “state terror” that the government’s reach is long.[83]
Time cannot cover up what the state disapproves of because its reach is long and deep, penetrating into every
household and digging intoturning upside down every pocket of privacy.
Overall, the Karakax List reveals a mindset whose perhaps most notable feature is the endless vicious cycles of
suspicion by association, which then passes on to others who associate with that person. This is precisely the reason
why, after her last visit to the region, Smith Finley wrote a piece titled “Now we don’t talk anymore”.[84]
Figures 8 to 10 show reasons for internment broken down by age cohort, with the percentages showing the relative
share of the occurrence of a feature across all age cohorts. For example, the age cohort 25 to 29 years constituted 31
percent of all occurrences of persons interned for being “untrustworthy” across all age cohorts. The findings support the
fact that “untrustworthiness” is indeed an age-related designation, largely limited to persons below the age of 40 (born in
the 80s and after).
Figure 8. Source: Karakax List.—
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The same breakdown for religion-related reasons shows almost the inverse picture. Those aged 45 and above are more
likely to have been interned for that reason than not, although religion-related internment was also a significant factor for
anyone above age 25.
Finally, internment due to any form of connection abroad was most predominant for those over the age of 55, likely
because they have the means to travel, but also because that age group is more inclined to travel for religious reasons
(join a Hajj). Even so, this category featured fairly prominently among all age groups.
Figure 9. Source: Karakax List.—
Figure 10. Source: Karakax List.—
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4.2.4 Verifying Reasons for Internment in Light of Policy and Other Sources
At the end of 2014, Xinjiang issued a document titled “Foundational knowledge for distinguishing religious extremism –
75 types of specific expressions” ( 75 ). The publication of this list was
linked back to the “document no. 11” on distinguishing the normal from extreme forms of religious practice, and
encouraged citizens to report any sightings of such behaviors to the police.[85] This list was again emphasized in
numerous government websites in the spring of 2017, often in the context of the village-work team campaign.[86] The
contents of this list form an important backdrop for understanding the reasons for internment stated in the Karakax List.
However, the reasons stated there are often very vague. Not uncommonly, persons were “sent to re-education because
they were infected by extreme religious thoughts” ( ), or simply “were influenced by extremist
thinking” ( ). Moreover, persons are listed to have been interned for reasons that are not in fact part of
these “75 signs of religious extremism”, for example, for having had religious marriage rites ( , Arabic “Nikah”), or
for “passionately donating money to a mosque” ( ). One person, whose verdict is not release but
“continued study”, has a verdict statement noting that this person in 2014 donated 5,000 RMB to a local public mosque
in Karakax township, as if such an act constituted a crime.[87] This confirms a report by Radio Free Asia, which stated
that the Imam of a mosque in Xinyuan County was detained for refusing to provide the authorities with a list of persons
who had made donations for the construction of a mosque.[88]
The other main set of reasons for internment, a connection to anything related to things outside the country, is often
even more mystifying. Persons are not only interned because they visited one of the mostly Muslim “26 focus countries”,
a practice reported by witnesses and previous media reports.[89] A substantial number of those on the list were
interned simply because they applied for a passport, without ever leaving the country. Those who committed this
“transgression” even carry a special designation in the document: they are referred to as “persons who applied for a
passport without leaving the country” ( ). In one case where this is cited as the only reason for
internment, it even comes with the blatant admission that there was “nothing unusual” about that person (
).[90] Some of those for whom this was listed as a reason for internment had applied for their passports
several years before the internment campaign. Sections that discuss release verdicts frequently number those within a
main person’s family circle who are abroad or who have applied for a passport, typically if these numbers are relatively
high. In those cases, the verdict within that particular data row is often: “continued study”.
Within three months after taking up office in Xinjiang, Chen Quanguo had the passports of minority citizens confiscated,
evidently to prevent them from traveling abroad.[91] A blunt admission that persons who simply applied for passports
are in fact targeted by state comes from China’s Ministry of Commerce. One of the village-based work teams that was
made up by members of its Xinjiang staff reported that 85 members of “special groups” received special training in
“resisting extreme thinking”, including “focus persons” ( ), women who wash bodies of the dead according to
religious rites, religious specialists, persons with religious knowledge who do not hold a related official position, and
“persons who applied for passports”.[92] In a local list contained in the file cache of the Töwet Township village-based
work teams, which is used to record all types of suspicious or “problem” persons, the names of people who applied for
a passports are to be recorded in a section titled “Focus / special persons”.[93] That section is also used to list persons
who are members of terrorist groups (including ISIS), “dangerous” persons, persons associated with the 2009 Urumqi
Riots, persons who attended secret scripture study sessions, and persons who have already gone through re-
education. The section about passport and travel is divided into three categories: 1) persons who applied for a
passport, 2) persons who hold a passport but have not left the country, and 3) persons who left by illegally crossing the
border.
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A government report from Turpan City about village-based work teams clarifies that the mandate to closely observe
suspicious persons pertains not only to “persons who went abroad and have not returned.” [94] Among those who are
suspect are also those who have returned, as they are now classified as “flow-back persons” ( ). On several
occasions, the Karakax List notes that persons were sent to re-education because they are “prevent flow-back persons”
( ). Those returning from other countries, especially Muslim nations, should be prevented from “slipping back”
unnoticed, because they might pose a danger to society, influencing those around them with the “extremist” ideologies
or subversive strategies that they supposedly acquired. In order to “prevent” them from returning and freely going about
their lives, the “prevent flow-back persons” approach places them under close surveillance. The county of Kargilik
(Ruoqiang) even issued a purchase bid for 200 surveillance cameras, to be installed near the homes of “focus persons”
and “prevent flow-back persons”.[95]
Attempted international travel is not the only issue that the state has with minority citizens. Anyone who often travels
outside their home region is suspect. For example, one person was interned because he is a long-distance taxi driver,
often leaves the region for substantial amounts of time, and communicates with many people. As a result, he is
considered an “untrustworthy” person. Other, similar examples include persons who work in other parts of the country
and are typically away from their home region. One of Chen Quanguo’s early policies in late 2016 was to require
Uyghurs to return to their original places of registration and to greatly impede their ability to travel. According to reports,
locals had to get official permission just to visit relatives in nearby villages.[96] Similarly, Uyghurs residing in other parts of
China were forced to return to their native regions in Xinjiang. Ultimately, all of these measures are implemented by the
state in order to gain complete control over people’s lives and movements. Preventing the free flow of persons helps the
state map networks of relations and interactions, which, due to the principle of guilt by association, constitutes a key
component of decisions for internment.
4.3 Family Circle, Social Circle and Religious Inheritance Circle
The data contained in the 11 column of the Karakax List show how the state seeks to evaluate individual behavior and
thought patterns in light of their family and social contexts. The principle of “guilt by association” is driven by detailed
Figure 11: Source: Source reference code: 19422.—
th
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evaluations of the numbers of persons in someone’s wider family context who are in some form of internment, and of
how religious knowledge was spread in the family.
The 11 data column first lists the number of persons in a main person’s circle of relatives ( ) and how many of
them are in re-education or detention centers. This circle includes parents (including parents-in-law), spouses, children,
and siblings. Besides showing name, ID number, residence and occupation, the spreadsheet lists their “current actual
behavior” and notes if (and when) they were interned. If family members of a main person are interned or in prison, that
fact counts against them in the verdict text. In one case where the verdict is “continued re-education”, the text notes that
“many family members are in strike-hard detention” ( ). That person has seven listed family
members, six of whom are in detention or re-education.[97] Conversely, verdicts may contain the positive note that
“among three generations of family members there are no persons in detention or re-education” (
).
The second data entry in the 11 column lists the “community circle” ( ) of a main person. Alternative names for
this type of data are “neighborhood circles” ( ) or “social circles” ( ). These typically list a few neighbors or
friends, but often the entries only summarize how many within these circles are themselves in detention. Again, a main
purpose of this type of analysis is to establish the extent to which main persons associate with others who are in a
detention or re-education facility.
The final type of data entry found in the 11 column is titled “religious inheritance circle” ( ). This data details
the ways in which religious knowledge was transmitted to the main person through (typically older) family members or
other persons. It gives details of religious habits, such as how often a person prays each day, whether they pray at
mealtimes, go to the mosque, fast during Ramadan, or exhibit other forms of religious practice. Importantly, all of the
religious practices listed in these sections are perfectly customary, peaceful, and appropriate expressions of Islamic
religiosity outside of China. The way that they are presented in the Karakax List shows how the state treats them as
illegal, a basis for discrimination, or at the very least problematic activities that must be closely examined and are used to
arrive at negative verdicts against persons. If anything, this type of data presents the strongest evidence seen by the
author that Beijing is actively persecuting and punishing normal practices of traditional religious beliefs, in direct violation
of its own constitution.
The Chinese terms cited above are not uncommon in government documents, with the exception of “religious
inheritance circle”. This term is rarely found, possibly due to its sensitive nature and specialized use. A notice issued by
the Karakax County Party Committee in April 2017, which mandates a careful investigation of local cadres, states that
this investigation is to evaluate “circles of relatives, religious inheritance circles, and social networks” (
).[98] The same wording is also found in a notice issued by the governments of Aksu Konaxeher
(Wensu) County (Aksu Prefecture) and Karamay City.[99]
4.4 Verdicts
The final verdicts for main persons were evaluated by sorting the rows for each identity ascending by row number. The
final row number contained the final verdict as shown in the document, with each main person having such a verdict.
Ultimately, 12.5 percent received a verdict mandating them to continue study or receive a harsher penalty such as
strike-hard detention. The remaining main persons were either to be released, to “continue” in their state of release, or to
first finish their minimum one-year period of “study” prior to release. Verdicts can also mandate changes to a person’s
management area within a camp. In one instance, the persons’ verdict stated: “change to strict management” (
).
th
th
th
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Of the 230 persons who were to be released, 48 explicitly received an appraisal to “continue” in this state ( …). The
China Cables VTIC management document specifically states that those who are released must remain under close
supervision and ongoing evaluation. The Karakax List clearly testifies to the fact. Those who are released are being
appraised in terms of their ongoing behavior, including participation in (mandatory) community activities. Examples
include: “[person shows] stable thinking after graduating” ( ), “co-operates with all community activities”
( ), or “no other illegal behaviors of any kind were discovered during [this person’s] period of residence
in our district” ( ).
Release verdicts can take several different forms. Sometimes, they used theo word “graduate [from studies]” ( ).
Frequently, they were more explicit in stating that a person was to be released into local (community or township)
“management and control” ( ). This term is commonly used for the re-integration of former prisoners or detainees into
society, and means that they are to remain under very close monitoring and supervision. The VTIC management
document from the China Cables explicitly states that “graduates” are to be closely monitored for one full year, and that
this involves “management and control”. (The exact same Chinese term ( ) is used). The local police authorities must
“grasp [their] actual behavior in a timely manner; they must take their responsibility to subject [graduates] to ongoing
educational assistance and management and control [ ] very seriously, even one person must not fall through the
cracks, there must be full coverage.”[100]
“Graduation” or release into “management and control” can take different forms. The Karakax List mentions two
instances in which camp detainees are directly transferred ( ) from their re-education camp to local regular
vocational schools. Subsequent verdicts indicate that these “students” continue to be subjected to ongoing monitoring,
with one verdict stating that “during the time at the school there were no law-violating behaviors” (
).[101]
Finally, “release” is often explicitly linked to subsequent employment. Of the 230 release verdicts, 50 explicitly mentioned
release into employment (or permission to remain in ongoing employment). Of these 50, 38 specifically stated “industrial
park employment” ( ). One particular verdict indicates a clear case of forced labor. This person is allowed to
Figure 12. Source: Karakax List.—
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“work in the industrial park, but not permitted to graduate” ( ).[102] The final verdict is that this
person is now “trustworthy” and consequently permitted to continue to work at the park. This piece of information
provides evidence confirms the author’s suspicion that many of those who supposedly “graduated” from VTICs were at
least initially still kept in the same internment conditions. In any case, it is clear that the employment performance of VTIC
“graduates” is subject to close monitoring and evaluation. The verdict of another case notes that the person “obeys the
industrial park management” ( ), and is therefore allowed to “continue to work at the industrial park” (
).[103]
Verdicts are subject to ongoing evaluations. The document shows 11 instances where a previous release verdict was
reversed, often indicated by the explicit wording “disagree …” ( ) and then a repetition of the past verdict phrase.
Reversals can again revert, fluctuating in close correspondence with the authorities’ appraisals of the behavior of the
interned person and their family. In one case with five data rows, the first verdict recommends “return home [into] local-
level control” ( ).[104] The verdict notes that the “actual behavior of [the person’s] family members is very good”
( … ), and that they “eagerly co-operate with community work” ( ). The second data
row explicitly reversed this first verdict with a “continued study (disagree with returning home into management and
control)” ( ( )). The brief verdict text only notes that the person’s “family relationships are
complicated” ( ), a reason that is also found in other verdict reversal cases. The third verdict simply cites
the original reasons for internment and leaves the “continued study” assessment unchanged. The fourth data row then
again recommends release, citing the exact same reason from the fist data row: “actual behavior of [the person’s] family
members is very good”. The fifth data row then again reverses the verdict to “continued study”. The main reason for this
change is most likely the fact that this person was moved from a “regular management area” in the camp (third data row)
to the strictest area, a fact that is highlighted in the verdict text. According to the VTIC management document from the
China Cables, only persons who are in the regular area are permitted to graduate.
Verdicts can also become more damning as the evidence increases. One person, interned for being a “two-faced
cadre”, was initially going to be released due to age (65 years) and various illnesses.[105] However, the next verdict
produces evidence of his children’s behaviors which he, as a cadre, should have prevented. Two of his daughters veiled
themselves between 2014 and 2015, and his son had eight instead of the legally permitted two children. One of his
children was now accused of having participated in an illegal religious organization, and the verdict notes that this cadre
has been hiding information without reporting it. The family is described as showing a strong anti-Han sentiment and
possessing a dense religious atmosphere. The third verdict repeats these allegations and notes that this cadre is now in
the camp’s “very strict” management area.
The document contains one instance where a person had to return to a camp.[106] The verdict text notes that “this
person often gets into fights and does not cooperateive with the community’s inspection work” (
).
Other verdict texts reveal some of the problems that the internment campaign has created. For example, one person is
required to continue in the camp because he is said to be “holding a grudge over his brother’s paralysis, there is an
anticipation [that he could take] revenge on society.” The document states that this brother participated in the June 26,
2013 incident in Hanerike Township (Hotan Prefecture). He must subsequently have spent time in a re-education facility,
because it then says that he was “released from study on June 22, 2018 for physical health reasons (paralysis).” We
can only speculate why and how the brother became paralyzed during internment.
Other verdicts reflect the fact that the state not only detains persons who are even slightly suspect, but also prefers to
keep them interned when any such doubts remain. One person for example was simply sent to re-education because
he had previously been in prison.[107] This person’s verdict states that they should remain in the camp because “the
[cases or issues] that they are related too are comparatively complex”. In reality, the state harbors suspicions towards
this person but apparently lacks any real evidence. Rather than acting on the principle of the presumption of innocence,
the state prefers to presume guilt. The re-education system is the ideal place where it can “park” such people. Not only
are the camps places where people are kept under complete control and hence pose no risk to society; they are also
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loci of ongoing transformation, meaning the longer a person stays there, the closer they become aligned (in theory) with
CCP-sanctioned ways of thinking and acting.
Typically, intermittent or final verdicts that recommend ongoing study note that the person in question has not
experienced sufficient changes in their thinking or attitudes, or, more rarely, that there is a lack of cooperation in some
respect. Frequently, they cite the person’s past misdemeanors without noting anything positive in addition to them. One
case exemplifies this aptly.[108] There, the initial verdict was “release”, noting that the person’s “thinking was greatly
transformed“ ( ). The second verdict, however, recommended “continued study”. The second verdict,
however, recommended “continued study” and cited two facts to support that decision. On the one hand, the person’s
“thought transformation” was now only deemed to be “average” ( ). On the other hand, their family
members had not participated in the mandatory community flag raising events in a “timely manner”.
Besides the perceived behavior and thinking of the person in re-education, the ultimate verdict that they receive appears
to be dependent on two other factors: a) the behavior of their family members, and b) the original reasons for their
internment.
Family behavioral performance is explicitly named in 59.7 percent of all 311 cases, and in 67.0 percent of cases where
the person is not already in a state of ongoing release. Family performance becomes much less relevant when a person
was already released and is under ongoing monitoring. In those cases, verdicts typically only mention that person’s
behavior back in the community (see examples mentioned above). Otherwise, family behavior is crucial. In a number of
instances, improved family performance is the only reason given for a positive verdict. The reason for this is that the
authorities are apparently wary to release persons back into family contexts where they might again fall into religious
thought or behavior patterns. Both original reasons for internment and verdict texts very commonly mention the “religious
atmosphere” of person’s families.
Generally, there appears to be a broad correlation between the nature of persons’ ultimate verdict as shown in the
document, and the originally stated reason for their internment (Table 4). Cases where religion featured in the original
internment explanation are twice as likely to result in a continued internment verdict as the total sample (25.3 versus
12.5 percent, for all 311 main persons). Similarly, 21.0 percent of those with a “link abroad” internment reason received
a continued internment verdict, far higher than the average. However, when removing all those from this sub-sample
who also had a religion-related internment reason, that share drops sharply to 6.3 percent.
Original internment reason(s) Continued internment verdict
Total sample 12.5%
“Untrustworthy” (all cases) 5.2%
“Untrustworthy” (no other reasons) 2.8%
“Untrustworthy” (and religion-related) 11.5%
Religion-related (all cases) 25.3%
Link abroad (all cases) 21.0%
Link abroad (only not religion-related cases) 6.3%
Link to detained persons (all cases) 16.7%
Table 4. Continued interned verdicts exclude verdicts that simply mandate completion of the minimum one-year
internment period.
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Overall, it seems evident that a religion-related original internment reason makes it far more likely for interned persons to
be forced into ongoing re-education. This seems logical, given that the state’s primary concerns with persons who have
been abroad or maintain some kind of connection abroad are related to religious practice. The government list of 26
“focus countries” squarely centers on nations with significant Muslim populations, and the state’s suspicions toward
Uyghurs’ connections abroad are closely related to concerns over religious radicalization.
Similarly, there is an apparent correlation between age and verdict result. Among main persons aged 19 to 29 years, the
share of those consigned to ongoing study (or strike-hard detention) stood at only 5.9 percent, versus 12.0 percent for
those aged 30 to 44 years, and 22.1 percent for those aged 45 to 65 years. However, this correlation is more than likely
superficial because persons in the higher age groups also much more commonly had religion-related reasons for
internment.
In order to assess the effects of different variables on release or non-release, the author employed a logistic regression
model. Release versus non-release was the binary dependent variable, and age (metric) as well as three of the binary
coding categories for original internment reasons, “untrustworthy”, “religion-related”, and “link abroad” were the
explanatory variables.[109] In a model without interaction effects between the explanatory variables, “religion-related”
emerged as the only statistically significant explanatory variable for release versus non-release, although having a link
abroad came close to the required 95% confidence interval level (Table 5). “Religion-related” again remained as the only
statistically significant explanatory variable after taking into account level 2 interaction effects, although age came close to
the required 95% confidence interval level (Table 6). At the same time, the relatively low goodness of fit values of the
model indicate that much of the variation in regard to the verdict cannot be explained by any of these variables, and is to
be attributed to other variables: in particular, the external and internal changes of the interned person and of their family
members, as evaluated by the state.[110]
Source Value Standard
error
Wald Chi-
Square
Pr > Chi² Wald
Lower
bound
(95%)
Wald
Upper
bound
(95%)
Odds ratio
Intercept 2.76 0.83 11.02 0.00 1.13 4.39
Age -0.01 0.02 0.33 0.57 -0.05 0.03 0.99
Untrustworthy 0.74 0.55 1.77 0.18 -0.35 1.82 2.09
Religion-related .08 0.38 7.96 0.00 -1.83 -0.33 0.34
link abroad -0.68 0.39 3.01 0.08 -1.46 0.09 0.50
Table 5. Logistic regression of the relationships between age and reasons for internment on release verdicts (no
interactions between explanatory variables). R²(McFadden) = 0.09, R²(Cox and Snell) = 0.06, and R²(Nagelkerke) =
0.12. The low goodness of fit values compared to table 6 indicate that interaction effects between explanatory variables
are significant; also, that there are other, pertinent variables with a systematic effect: the perceived behavior of detainees
and their families, along with the idiosyncrasies of each case.
Source Value Standard
error
Wald Chi-
Square
Pr > Chi² Wald
Lower
bound
(95%)
Wald
Upper
bound
(95%)
Odds
ratio
Intercept 4.69 1.48 10.01 0.00 1.78 7.60
Age -0.06 0.03 3.21 0.07 -0.13 0.01 0.94
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Untrustworthy 0.79 2.37 0.11 0.74 -3.87 5.44 2.20
Religion-related -4.05 1.78 5.18 0.02 -7.53 -0.56 0.02
link abroad -1.65 1.81 0.83 0.36 -5.19 1.90 0.19
Age*Untrustworthy 0.00 0.07 0.00 0.96 -0.15 0.14 1.00
Age*Religion-related 0.07 0.04 3.02 0.08 -0.01 0.15 1.07
Age*link abroad 0.02 0.04 0.21 0.65 -0.07 0.11 1.02
Untrustworthy*Religion-
related
-0.33 1.15 0.08 0.77 -2.58 1.91 0.72
Religion-related*link
abroad
0.32 0.88 0.13 0.72 -1.41 2.05 1.37
Table 6. Logistic regression of the relationships between age and reasons for internment on release verdicts (level 2
interactions between explanatory variables). R²(McFadden) = 0.24, R²(Cox and Snell) = 0.17, and R²(Nagelkerke) =
0.31. The relatively low goodness of fit values indicate that there are other, pertinent variables with a systematic effect:
the perceived behavior of detainees and their families, which are routinely mentioned, along with the idiosyncrasies of
each case.
The insights gained from analyzing verdicts point to the essential ongoing role of village-based work teams, not only a
role of gathering evidence that leads to internment. A spreadsheet from the Beshtoghraq ( ) village work
team, a township in Lop County, Hotan Prefecture, designed to gather information about released persons and their
family members, has a special column titled “actual behavior” ( ).[111] This particular term is found in nearly all
verdict texts and can apply to the evaluation of either individual or family behavior. The spreadsheet then has work teams
appraise these persons as being in one of four categories, from A to D.
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A second file from the same region shows a version of this spreadsheet with actual data (Figure 14). It indicates that D is
the best appraisal level, indicating that a person is permitted to be at home. Level C means that persons are supposed
to be in VTICs, level B stands for VTICs or imprisonment, and level A, presumably the worst, is not found in the file. The
“actual behavior” assessment only applies to those who are currently at home. In each instance below, this behavior
was rated as “average” ( ).
Similarly, a government document from Hotan Prefecture from April 2019 notes that work teams are to assess the
“actual behavior” ( ) of households, as does a village-based work team regulation from Karakax County from
March 2016. This explains why Chen Quanguo declared the village-based work teams to be an essential long-term
component of Xinjiang’s stability maintenance strategy.
5.0 Conclusions and Overall Significance
More than any other piece of publicly available evidence, the Karakax List presents us with an intimate picture of the
inner workings of Beijing’s surreptitious battle for control over innermost human terrains of identity and allegiance. It
dramatically reflects the extent to which the Chinese Communist Party has codified its intrinsic fear of religiosity and
ethnic difference into a sophisticated set of internally consistent, quasi-scientific criteria for internment and release. This
set of criteria constitutes the core of Beijing’s extrajudicial internment drive in Xinjiang.
Figure 13. Source: Source reference code: 62451.—
Figure 14. Source: Source reference code: 62451. Only shows the last 26 of a total of 76 entries. Columns containing names and
ID numbers were shortened in order to protect the identities of the persons shown.
—
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Driven by the underlying principles of the presumption of guilt (rather than of innocence) and guilt by association, Beijing
has managed to intern a targeted subset of the region’s Turkic minority populations in a way that holds entire minority
populations hostage to their own behavioral performances. Through the ways in which release verdicts are assessed,
whole family units are forced into a continuous mode of pre-emptive obedience. They are made to shun even the
slightest observable forms of religiosity, knowing that it could lead to new internments, or prolong existing ones.
The policies implemented under Chen Quanguo have enabled the state to gain control over precisely those areas that
Beijing has traditionally struggled with: control over religious practice; control over other markers of ethno-racial difference
such as language, traditions, and dress; control over movement; and control over intergenerational transmission.
Can this work? Will Beijing’s re-education and social re-engineering drive in Xinjiang raise up a brainwashed, docile
playbook version of minorities, a “model for the world to emulate” as touted by state media?
On the surface, the answer might be yes. If anything, the Karakax List amply demonstrates that anyone who does not
conform to the state’s scheme of micromanaged social coercion has virtually no chance of escaping the system.
However, by replacing trust with control, Beijing has arguably traded short-term gains for long-term jeopardies.
The first jeopardy pertains to mechanism of governance. While employing advanced technology at virtually every step of
the process, the Karakax List shows that the whole scheme relies heavily on a labor-intensive micromanagement of
minority communities. Given that oppression does not create mutual trust, Chen Quanguo’s words that the village-
based work teams are a long-term component of Xinjiang’s stability maintenance should be taken at face value. That
means that the state’s ability to maintain total control is predicated upon its ongoing ability to harness and finance
significant numbers of loyal cadres who are willing to continually intrude into the private lives of the inferior citizenry. This
mechanism itself is predicated upon unequal power relations, and hence perpetuates them by design.
This latter fact points to the second jeopardy. Beijing’s governance approach in Xinjiang is one of control and coercion
rather than mutual trust. Presently, the state has maneuvered itself into a situation where it cannot but keep its minority
underclass in a quasi-narcotic state of compliant passivity and numb acquiescence, with no opportunity to process the
trauma of their captivity. Not even their own four walls is a safe place for venting anger, hurt, or pain. Many victims of re-
education internment report symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. All this is hardly a recipe for long-term social
stability. In the past, anger and frustration were vented through various means, including acts of violence. Will they now
just remain bottled up?
Regardless of these two systematic risks, the long-term success of Beijing’s strategy in Xinjiang relies on a near-perfect
substitution of intergenerational transmission. As parental generations are severely weakened and forced into
submission, a new generation of young Uyghurs is being raised in educational institutions that are tightly controlled by
the Party. This strategy, however, will not likely succeed. The main reason for this is that Uyghurs and other ethnic
minority groups are still identified as such and therefore know that they are somehow different. This sense of difference is
greatly exacerbated by the fact that the Han majority continues to treat them as second-class citizens. Research by the
author and others into the identity of minorities who grow up in Han-dominated contexts shows that the experience of
being different reinforces their original identity.[112] Given that the governance mechanisms that undergird China’s
control over Xinjiang prescribe the perpetuation of such asymmetric ethnic relations, they represent a powerful force that
could largely nullify the effects of intergenerational separation.
Beijing would need to ship minority infants to eastern Chinese communities and have them grow up as if they were Han
and enjoyed completely equal rights. Assimilation would take place as bonds of mutual trust and equality flourish.
However, the exact opposite is taking place. Sooner or later, the next generation of Uyghurs will actively try to find out
who they truly are. The answer to that burning question will be found among the oppressed older generations.
At best, Beijing will succeed in splitting these ethnic groups into those who willingly integrate and enjoy the related
benefits, and those who resist. However, there is already a generation of Uyghurs who pursued exactly such
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integrationist strategies and were still met with persecution and internment. The fact that Beijing did not even trust those
who willingly opted for economic, cultural, and even political integration has sent one overarching message to the
Uyghur communities: they will never be trusted, and they will never be accepted as equal. Their submission only
temporarily allays the intrinsic fears of their masters.
With its most recent policies, Beijing has both exacerbated and cemented existing asymmetries to the point where equal
relationships of mutual trust are extremely unlikely to develop. Consequently, the relationship between the state and the
Turkic minorities in Xinjiang is both complex and difficult to predict in the long-term.
Adrian Zenzisa Senior Fellow in China Studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, Washington, D.C.
(non-resident), and supervises PhD students at the European School of Culture and Theology, Korntal, Germany.He
specializes in China’s ethnic minority policy, minority education systems, public recruitment (especially teacher and
police/security-related recruitment), public bid documentation, domestic security budgets and securitization practices in
China’s Tibetan regions and Xinjiang. He has authored Tibetanness under Threat (Global Oriental, 2013) and co-edited
Mapping Amdo: Dynamics of Change (Prague: Oriental Institute, 2017).
[1] The author would like to thank: his research assistants Cheryl Yu and Alexander Thilmany for their hard work, without
which this report would not have been possible; Elise Anderson, senior program officer at the Uyghur Human Rights
Project, for assistance with the analysis of transliterated Uyghur names and with the transliteration of Uyghur place
names.
[2] Approximately 2,800 adults plus several hundred minors.
[3] https://web.archive.org/web/20180827152731/http://news.163.com/14/1118/10/ABB06EE800014AED.html.
Compare https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/4j6rq/, page 10.
[4] Source reference code: 74128.
[5] See https://www.jpolrisk.com/wash-brains-cleanse-hearts for further details. The sources from this file cache are
referenced through source reference codes in order to protect ongoing research.
[6] https://www.xjht.gov.cn/article/show.php?itemid=279324
[7] Xinjiang 2018 statistical yearbook, table 3-7.
[8] www.myx.gov.cn/cms/index.php_m=content&a=index&classid=410&id=15144.html or
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1U8bDJUfF2ByCL8c3YbDesBoJzcWY4EW6/view?usp=sharing
[9] https://web.archive.org/web/20180906113745/http://www.dlzb.com/d-zb-1685922.html
[10] http://web.archive.org/web/20190706211302/https://www.xjht.gov.cn/file/upload/201812/02/122854473.docx
or http://archive.is/T8Wtx
[11] https://web.archive.org/web/20180617184616/http://www.bidchance.com/info.do?channel=calgg&id=21056414
and http://archive.is/g00mv
[12] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2.
[13] https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Kfuyy6U5zPWgRxsH_0A1xK4DTbgB3ZcN.
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[14] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2.
[15] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2.
[16] http://web.archive.org/web/20190706211302/https://www.xjht.gov.cn/file/upload/201812/02/122854473.docx
[17] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2.
[18] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2. See also the business registration details of the Karakax County
Bosidankule Aziz Bakur Restaurant ( ), which is located in district no. 12 (
): https://www.tianyancha.com/company/3162258263.
[19] http://copyright2006www.myx.gov.cn/cms/index.php?m=content&a=index&classid=240&id=2568 or
http://archive.is/vELcH. A substantial number of additional districts were added in 2016 and 2017.
[20] www.myx.gov.cn/cms/index.php_m=content&a=index&classid=315&id=12308.html or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1l-N6mMNuh0GE4OenbI-xNo5IYb-IX4r8.
[21] Document “ 2017 .docx” from www.myx.gov.cn or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Ir5ev-85ZiUMd31vgSHiac5_R9vIdniY.
[22] “ 4-1 4-3.xlsx “ from www.xjht.gov.cn or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1WKpaRhY5VlGac1cbCjKd5BVpi5bcqLa2.
[23] 3 .docx from www.myx.gov.cn or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Ir5ev-85ZiUMd31vgSHiac5_R9vIdniY.
[24] Location: 37°13’42.55″N 79°44’14.44″E
[25] www.myx.gov.cn/cms/index.php_m=content&a=index&classid=211&id=16818.html or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=18JKPoIgT1ysTcA1FeOBlehMtysqVPYQg, compare
http://hhysjm.com/csmcc/jjey/jtyw/432378/index.html.
[26] http://archive.is/Sca5o
[27] See https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/4j6rq/.
[28] http://www.zgtks.gov.cn/info/egovinfo/1001/govinfo_pub/details_gov/11654127010357679U-02_Z/2019-
1216006.htm or http://archive.is/pZv3R
[29] http://news.ifeng.com/a/20141205/42652647_0.shtml or http://archive.is/wip/Np4TU
[30] https://web.archive.org/web/20180827151028/http://xj.people.com.cn/n/2015/0114/c188514-23545423.html
[31] A detailed explanation of these three approaches can be found at http://xjtzb.gov.cn/2016-
03/14/content_509505.htm or http://archive.is/wip/Mz9Qq.
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[32] http://www.xjdaily.com/special/2014/008/1028550.shtml
[33] Compare related studies by Darren Byler, http://www.chinafile.com/reporting-opinion/postcard/million-citizens-
occupy-uighur-homes-xinjiang, and James Leibold, https://www.prcleader.org/leibold.
[34] http://www.xjdaily.com.cn/special/2014/06/1027136.shtml
[35] http://news.ifeng.com/a/20160829/49857646_0.shtml
[36] https://www.hrw.org/zh-hans/news/2013/06/18/250209
[37] http://web.archive.org/web/20170815101632/http://cpc.people.com.cn/n1/2016/1110/c117005-28851317-
2.html Compare also the statement “ “ ” 2016
”, www.xjcz.gov.cn/zxgz/xjch/201710/P020190404022732222424.pdf or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1EIxmiBZvKdTSZa683jfWUrVxg7RNcgdv
[38] http://www.xj-agri.gov.cn/tongzgg01/35338.jhtml or http://archive.is/rLRa1
[39] http://www.xjyc.gov.cn/html/rdgz/2017-3-28/1558865665.html or http://archive.is/Lr82w
[40] http://www.xj-agri.gov.cn/tongzgg01/35338.jhtml or http://archive.is/rLRa1, compare
http://www.xjnj.gov.cn/syss/xxyd/201803/121142108glu.html or http://archive.is/GjQvz.
[41] http://www.xj-agri.gov.cn/nyncdt/32913.jhtml or http://archive.is/5GXHA
[42] https://jamestown.org/program/xinjiangs-rapidly-evolving-security-state/
[43] http://www.sic.gov.cn/News/259/7698.htm or http://archive.is/wip/23U2i
[44] http://www.zgkashi.com/szyw/201701/t20170114_32425.html or http://archive.is/jDaPa
[45] Source reference code: 68305.
[46] http://web.archive.org/web/20170815101632/http://cpc.people.com.cn/n1/2016/1110/c117005-28851317-
2.html
[47] http://www.scio.gov.cn/m/zhzc/8/2/Document/1391426/1391426.htm or http://archive.is/wip/qjclU. At times also
used in a tripartite form: “remove the cover, eliminate the nest, dig behind the curtain” ( ).
[48] Source reference code: 10452.
[49] http://web.archive.org/web/20200205231150/http://www.xjhfpc.gov.cn/info/1437/8234.htm
[50] Source reference code: 77128.
[51] Source reference code: 76690.
[52]
www.xjht.gov.cn/file/upload/201812/11/2017ÄêµØÇø±¾¼¶Ô¤Ë㵥λ²¿ÃžöË㹫¿ª²ÄÁÏ/2017Äê½Ì¿ÆÎIJ¿ÃžöË㹫¿ªµ¥Î»²ÄÁÏ(61)/
µØί/н®Î¬Îá¶û×ÔÖÎÇøÖй²ºÍÌïµØί°ì¹«ÊÒ£¨±¾¼¶£©_ºÍÌïµØί°ì¹«ÊÒ2017Ä겿ÞöËã·ÖÎö±¨¸æ1.doc or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1QELCYQ_SxkRUNnVVaxe2u6cFDuVIunYj
8/29/2020 The Karakax List: Dissecting the Anatomy of Beijing’s Internment Drive in Xinjiang | Journal of Political Risk
https://www.jpolrisk.com/karakax/ 39/42
[53] http://www.xjlyt.gov.cn/ztlm/fhj/dlz/1722.htm or http://archive.is/wip/XOQvJ
[54] Source reference code: 50042. Compare http://www.chinalaw.gov.cn/Department/content/2017-
09/26/565_8587.html or http://archive.is/y3XSi for use of the expression “ ”.
[55] https://www.icij.org/investigations/china-cables/read-the-china-cables-documents/
[56] For a detailed study of the workings of the IJOP, see the related report by Human Rights Watch:
https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/05/01/chinas-algorithms-repression/reverse-engineering-xinjiang-police-mass-
surveillance#2fe00a
[57]
http://web.archive.org/web/20190807205819/http://www.fk.gov.cn/wcm.files/upload/CMSfk/201806/201806060532047.doc
[58] See also https://www.fzfwbj.com/xw/djdt/17488.htm or http://archive.is/wip/S2Kkf.
[59] Source reference code: 24366.
[60] Source reference code: 34912.
[61] http://www.xjhfpc.gov.cn/info/1437/8234.htm
[62] Source reference code: 32114.
[63] Numerous examples include
http://web.archive.org/web/20200110152729/www.bjtq.gov.cn/info/2495/49901.htm,
http://web.archive.org/web/20200206161310/http://www.xjfzb.com/contents/238/106966.html, or
http://web.archive.org/web/20200206161334/http://www.xjhfpc.gov.cn/info/1435/3857.htm.
[64] See e.g. www.bjtq.gov.cn/info/2495/49901.htm or http://archive.is/wip/UwCcV.
[65] For example source reference code: 14156.
[66] Xinjiang Caikuai magazine, 2017 (issue no. 4), articles under the section “fanghuiju activity”, source:
http://web.archive.org/web/20200117024930/www.xjcz.gov.cn/zxgz/xjch/201710/P020190404022732222424.pdf
[67]
http://web.archive.org/web/20200117024930/www.xjcz.gov.cn/zxgz/xjch/201710/P020190404022732222424.pdf
[68] Source reference code: 83715.
[69] http://www.xjlyt.gov.cn/ztlm/fhj/dlz/1722.htm and
www.xjht.gov.cn/file/upload/201812/11/2017ÄêµØÇø±¾¼¶Ô¤Ë㵥λ²¿ÃžöË㹫¿ª²ÄÁÏ/2017Äê½Ì¿ÆÎIJ¿ÃžöË㹫¿ªµ¥Î»²ÄÁÏ(61)/
µØί/н®Î¬Îá¶û×ÔÖÎÇøÖй²ºÍÌïµØί°ì¹«ÊÒ£¨±¾¼¶£©_ºÍÌïµØί°ì¹«ÊÒ2017Ä겿ÞöËã·ÖÎö±¨¸æ1.doc
orhttps://drive.google.com/open?id=1QELCYQ_SxkRUNnVVaxe2u6cFDuVIunYj
[70]
http://web.archive.org/web/20200206172803/http://www.loulan.gov.cn/UploadFiles/zhuantizhuanji/2018/12/201812201527151127.p
and www.loulan.gov.cn – .docx or
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ht1FYsjdIMXgT8JAZc33hKaIvmWsWxLq.
8/29/2020 The Karakax List: Dissecting the Anatomy of Beijing’s Internment Drive in Xinjiang | Journal of Political Risk
https://www.jpolrisk.com/karakax/ 40/42
[71] Source reference code: 49105.
[72] ID 6532221992092*****
[73] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html
[74] https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/4j6rq/
[75] https://apnews.com/6753f428edfd439ba4b29c71941f52bb
[76] http://id.weixingmap.com
[77] ID number checksum verification was performed via http://id.weixingmap.com.
[78] There are far less sequential code combinations than 1,000. The author estimated them conservatively at 166
based on variation in the actual document.
[79] https://www.jpolrisk.com/wash-brains-cleanse-hearts/
[80] https://www.jpolrisk.com/wash-brains-cleanse-hearts/
[81] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6558506-China-Cables-IJOP-Daily-Bulletin-14-English.html
[82] https://www.aspi.org.au/report/mapping-xinjiangs-re-education-camps
[83] See
https://digital.lib.washington.edu/researchworks/bitstream/handle/1773/42946/Byler_washington_0250E_19242.pdf
and https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02634937.2019.1586348.
[84] http://www.chinafile.com/reporting-opinion/viewpoint/now-we-dont-talk-anymore
[85] https://news.ifeng.com/a/20141224/42785382_0.shtml or http://archive.is/TlazC, or
http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2014-12-24/093231321497.shtml.
[86] See e.g. www.xjgrain.gov.cn/mtjj/content15406.html or http://archive.is/wip/5wUZt.
[87] ID no. 6532221966030*****.
[88] https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/shaoshuminzu/ql1-04112019095608.html
[89] https://www.wsj.com/articles/twelve-days-in-xinjiang-how-chinas-surveillance-state-overwhelms-daily-life-
1513700355
[90] ID no. 6532221992030*****.
[91] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/01/world/asia/passports-confiscated-xinjiang-china-uighur.html
[92] http://xinjiang.mofcom.gov.cn/article/minsheng/201606/20160601340255.shtml or http://archive.is/wip/V2uQc
[93] Source reference code: 19422.
8/29/2020 The Karakax List: Dissecting the Anatomy of Beijing’s Internment Drive in Xinjiang | Journal of Political Risk
https://www.jpolrisk.com/karakax/ 41/42
[94] http://www.tlf.gov.cn/info/6591/161740.htm or http://archive.is/wd3Jc
[95] ztb.xjjs.gov.cn/xjweb/ZtbInfo/ZBGG_Detail.aspx/index3d64.html or https://drive.google.com/open?
id=1Y3vSDcSGB4BuvoJYqvILa8MI3NUot15T.
[96] Numerous conversations of the author with visitors to Xinjiang, as well as persons in China with close contacts in
southern Xinjiang.
[97] ID no. 6532221988040*****.
[98] Source reference code: 73718.
[99] http://m.fx361.com/news/2019/0906/6138192.html or http://archive.is/wip/HyKtL; https://www.tongguan-
tongban.com/html/zzgzzzxx20185680430.html or http://archive.is/wip/c9jSV.
[100] Original section in the document: 21.
[101] ID no. 6532221994080*****
[102] ID no. 6532221984010*****
[103] ID no. 6532221991011*****
[104] ID no. 6532221975051*****
[105] ID no. 6532221954082*****
[106] ID no. 6532221996013*****
[107] ID no. 6532221983041*****
[108] ID no. 6532221978080*****
[109] Minimum sample size requirement was computed as N = 10 k / p = 10 * 4 / (62/310) = 200. The actual sample
size was 310. A regression of more coded internment reasons with fewer occurrences for main persons would require a
sample size that exceeds the available figure. The resulting model showed a -2 Log(Likelihood) (Chi² 56) p < 0.0001.
[110] R²(McFadden) = 0.24, R²(Nagelkerke) = 0.31.
[111] Source reference code: 62451.
[112] See e.g. https://brill.com/view/title/24528?language=en, and Grose, Timothy, 2015. ” (Re)Embracing Islam in
Neidi: the ‘Xinjiang Class’ and the dynamics of Uyghur ethno-national identity”, Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 24,
No. 91, 101–118, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10670564.2014.918408.
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