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The sprawling Xinjiang is the latest region in China to be hit with sweeping COVID-19 travel restrictions as China further tightens controls ahead of a key Communist Party congress later this month.
On Thursday, it was reported that trains and buses to and from the region’s 22 million people had been suspended and the number of passengers on flights had been reduced to 75%.
Like China’s draconian “zero-coronavirus” policy, the measures appear to be disproportionate to the number of cases detected.
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The National Health Commission announced only 93 cases in Xinjiang on Wednesday and 97 on Thursday, all asymptomatic. On Tuesday, Xinjiang leaders acknowledged problems with testing and control measures, but did not say when they planned to lift restrictions.
Officials are desperate not to be called up for new outbreaks in their region, and Xinjiang has been under special scrutiny because the government has set up a series of prison-like re-education centers where Muslim minorities are taught to renounce their religion and live according to the law. alleged to have been subjected to a series of human rights violations.
Xinjiang’s sprawling surveillance system, which relies on ubiquitous checkpoints, facial and even voice recognition software, and general cellphone surveillance, makes it particularly easy to control crowds.
“Coronavirus Zero” is closely associated with Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping, who is expected to receive a third five-year term at the congress that begins on October 16. China’s economy, education and normal life.
Last month, a night bus crash that killed 27 people was forcibly diverted to a mass quarantine site in southwestern China, sparking a storm of anger online over the harshness of the policy. Survivors said they were forced to leave their apartments even though no cases were detected.
The country’s leaders celebrate “zero COVID” as proof that its system is superior to the U.S., where more than 1 million people have died from COVID-19.
Xi called China’s approach a “major strategic success” and demonstrated that its political system has “significant advantages” over Western liberal democracies.
However, even as other countries open up, the humanitarian cost of China’s response to the pandemic is increasing.
In Shanghai earlier this year, desperate residents complained about not being able to get medicine or even groceries during the city’s two-month lockdown, while some died in hospitals due to lack of medical care as the city restricted movement. Last week, residents in western Xinjiang said they went hungry during the more than 40-day lockdown.
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