According to an estimate made by the UN Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, at least one million "Uighurs", a Muslim minority, is currently detained in fields of political indoctrination.
For the Committee, which stated that it had received several reports of torture, "the detentions are extra-legal, without any legal representation permitted throughout the arrest and detention process."
A representative of the Chinese government replied to the accusations made by the UN Committee, calling the "completely false" allegations of mass imprisonment.
Hu Lianhe, spokesperson for the China Department of Labor, told the UN group that "the citizens of Xinjiang, including Uyghurs, enjoy equal liberties and rights" and stressed that "there is no arbitrary detention or lack of freedom of religion and belief "and that there are no" re-education centers ", stating that criminals arrested for" minor crimes "have been assigned to" vocational training centers in order to assist them in their rehabilitation ".
The charges, however, were confirmed by China Human Rights Defenders, a Hong Kong-based NGO, according to whom "evidence of arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment is overwhelming".
Gay McDougall, vice president of the UN commission, said that "we must have more than a denial of the charges" and called for further evidence from China to counter the claims of human rights groups.