1 - Intermarriage as “Xinjiang Genocide”: A Problem from Nowhere

Forced intermarriage has accompanied some intentional destructions of ethnic groups but is also invoked in the proliferation of untenable claims of genocide.  These claims are made regardless of whether the putative “genocide” bears any relationship to the legal or popular definition of the crime.  Forced intermarriage is not a “genocidal act” under the Genocide Convention, but Western politicians, media and NGOs assert that coerced intermarriage is part of an ongoing genocide of Uyghurs, the largest ethnic group in China’s largest province.  Uyghur émigrés have made that assertion since at least 2007, but without documenting any instance of a Uyghur forced into intermarriage.  Such claims are thus part of the common political stratagem of crying “genocide,” to isolate an opponent state or organization, mobilize ethnic group members, and garner support for the group from third-party powers.  Unlike the real genocides that have famously been called “A Problem from Hell,” asserted forced intermarriage as Uyghur genocide is a political fantasy – a “problem from nowhere.”