State strategies to implement (and hide) genocide in China and Myanmar since 2017

This chapter address two genocides that were launched in 2017 in Asia by the neo-nationalist regimes in China and in Myanmar (Burma). The first, in China's northwestern Xinjiang region (East Turkistan), targets the Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other indigenous peoples who are predominantly Muslim; the other, in Myanmar, targets the Rohingya Muslim minority. Both genocides are rooted in long-running discrimination of the targeted peoples, both were launched under a newly ascendant and dominant ideology of national and religious purification. Howver the strategies of the two genocides contrast sharply: The Myanmar Rohingya genocide is focused on expelling the targeted population (about 2m) from the country, and destroying their homes. In the Chinese genocide, the targeted peoples (about 15m) are subjected to forced assimilation in a cross-society campaign to destroy native languages and cultures, so as to erase their original ethnic identity and transform everyone into Chinese. In this chapter, I discuss the two genocides, as well as the contrast between them: Expulsion at gunpoint, vs. assimilation at gunpoint. I also discuss the efforts made by both regimes to deny and cover up the atrocities, not least by way of supporting each other on the international arena