november 14 as always you will find the senate live here on c-span2. we take you back now to our booktv programming. >> thank you so much for joining us today. my name is bethany allen-ebrahimian, on the china reporter at axios and i'm here today at hudson institute to speak with nury turkel, senior fellow here at hudson about his new book which we have right here called "no escape." and let me first introduce nury. he is a senior fellow here. he is a lawyer. he is vice chair of the u.s. commission on international religious freedom, and he is cofounder of the uyghur human rights project. he is one of the most prominent people who has been speaking out

about the uyghur situation, the uyghur repression and the uyghur genocide in china for years. and i'm thrilled today to be able to talk to them about his book, learn more about his life story, his hard work, the challenges he has faced in what he sees going forward for the uyghur people. so thank you so much for joining us today, nury. >> thank you very much for having this conversation with me. >> i would like to ask you about the book project itself. how did it get started? when did you start thinking about writing a book and added a come to be? i >> thank you. if i may i would like to by thanking my colleaguess here at the hudson institute, and leadership and support team, professional staff for sharing their knowledge and supporting my work over the year. i have v been very pleased to he

this opportunity to work with world-class scholars at hudson. the idea of writing this book has been in my mind for a long time but i never thought i would be writing a memoir, early in life. in early 2019 you know very well about the frustration that many of us who work and the human rights field not getting enough attention on the atrocities being committed in china, xi jinping's china. i was presented this opportunity at the oslo freedom forum to do a stage talk, opening speech. in my speech i highlighted what is happening, what was happening and why it's happening and what should we do about it. i highlighted the surveillance aspect. i highlighted the collective punishment aspect i also highlighted the feigning ignorance of the business leaders such as the ceo of --

and also i brought up the olympic 1936 to make it relatable to the audience that their summit similarities between what happened to the jewish people during the second world war and what is happening in china today. after the talk i got a lot of compliments, and several authors came to me and suggested i should consider turning this ten minute speech into a a book pi started with that. and also that was the trigger, but i also believe in the power of storytelling. when you, for ordinary people, average people, people who are not closely following the politics in china like you i, usually don't see this as has been happening for so long. as long as i have been breathing. someone who lived through all of

it both inside and outside china i thought the story should be told by somebody who had been direct and i indirect victim of the atrocities committed by communist china so that's one. and two, i felt i owed it to the uyghur community, to the world, to share stories of those who have not have the type of opportunity and platform that i had. finally i wanted to use this book and this opportunity to tell the world or educate the world that this is no longer about a group of oppressed ethnic religious minority in china. the future.t what can future do we want? do we want to stop this kind of atrocities happening on worldwatch or you want to keep making empty promise that never again? >> i was struck when i was reading your book and i have my copy or because i took a lot of notes as i was reading.

to me because i covered this issue close a lot of the stories you told about the uyghurs who have input in the camps but have been able to leave and tell their story i was familiar with their stories but what's so interesting about hearing you are reading you write about them was you know them and you don't just, it's not that you met them but you know what where they grew up and the culture is one that you share. because of thatth i felt i could really live with them what they were experiencing. i found that to be very powerful. another thing that i really gleaned from this was your own personal story. so i hope you can share with everyone watching today some information about that. we know you as a lawyer. we know o you or someone who's very courageous on the international stage but your child is fascinating and says ao lot about the trajectory of the experience of uyghurs in china.

start with where you were born, even the building you were born in. >> i never thought i spatially coming to the united states pursuing graduate education and become a lawyer and living, working in nation's capital and also poorly the path to becoming an american citizen i thought my past history particularly the way that my parents brought me to this world almost irrelevant. who would like to talk about tragic stories? even my close associates close friends did not know that i was born in a reeducation camp during the height of the cultural revolution. there's so much relevancy to today's suffering that many uyghurst in during. for one, for starters, guilt by association. myid mom, my mother and my fathr did not commit any crime. their crime to the red guards

were my mom happened to be a daughter of uyghur nationalist, and my dad being a cousin or relative of somebody or individuals who migrated to the soviet union, controlled uzbekistan back in the '60s. so guilt by association. also the other aspect very similar is the way that they forced force by month to go through indoctrination, like like l abuses, physical abuses, dehumanization, that people in these days have been reading in the news. and finally the collective punishment aspect, even though that's a different type of setup of the red guards used to punish and transform uyghurs, specifically the uyghurs who are pious and following their way with traditional life, and intellectuals. that is also another thing. my dad is university educated

teacher who was sent to a labor camp to perform. when my mother was taken into the camp she was very young, a few months pregnant with me so she gave birth to me in the reeducation camp while she was pregnant she got injured so she was in cast chest down while she delivered me. as as a father of two young kis who have been to the hospital when my wife was delivering, i know how difficult it is to even go through a normal delivery process, let alone being in cast and in that environment. that makes it very special, it helped me develop a special bond with my parents. my mother is 72. she's still in chinese control, east turkestan the uyghurs likee to call. i have seen her since my law school graduation 2004, and i don't know if i will ever see her again. tragically i recently lost my father about a month ago when i

was in official trip to uzbekistan representing. i heard the news on my arrival would he passed away, but most heart-wrenching aspect of that, i know that this was coming. i thought that i was repaired but i wasn't. what i was not prepared is a fact that i could not even able to hold my mom when she is goinl through, when she lost her husband of 53 years, and also that close is about the same distance from here to new york. it's very close, same culture, same environment. because i got sanctioned last december by chinese regime -- >> congratulation. >> thank you. y thank you. for the policy announcement by the united states government, they include olympic boycott additional sanction. so it made it impossible. it's easy for those of us who

don't have thatam kind of childhood family connection, bua to me with that sanction i did not even have basic freedom to be there for my mom and carry my dad's casket. >> we can get to the reasons that you have been separated from their parents for so long and some of the dangers. you wrote, i just thought this was an interesting thing, that theur reeducation camps mother went to, she was 19 years old and just a few months pregnant when they took her in there. it wasn't hidden away. it was like in the city, to sort downtown, right? >> yes. >> so when she was eventually released you were released as a baby. eventually after the cultural revolution that building was torn down and it was a movie theater, a mall with a movie theater built and used to go there to see movies there which i think it's just a very

interesting like way of viewing the trajectory of china at that time. >> it is almost fascinating that you walk by a building where your mother was tortured and where you were kept, could not even see a natural daylight, causing a lot of health concerns. some people even suggested to my mom that i was not going to make it because of the health concerns that weree associated with my early childhood life. the building was a russian built, a giant building come up building with a giant big windows and doors. and when they turned that into, before they turned it into a mall it was so close to the area of myse uncles at shops to sell import/export products. i was walking literally buy on a regular basis and close to the center of the town, the central

square. after that, one of my uncles and opening a shop in that mall. i wanted every time when you walk by mom said that was the winter that i t tried to peek ot to see my mother could see me inside the building and i was just longing to see if your dad would walk by. so i heard that story. this is why i generally believe that the uyghurs never been, never had a chance to live like normal human beings. it started with even in my own life, even before i w was born o this world. so this is very personal to me. sometime when a share stories of others, too polite to her about my story but other people's stories much more horrific, heart wrenching,, as you know from your previous reporting is. >> another part of this trajectory you mentioned is in the 1980s. there was something of a cultural flowering, a brief period when cash car come when

the local authorities rebuilt some of the traditional things. what is happening now though? >> it's the polar opposite. this is something that always say, using whatever the platform official private, whenever the government respect individual rights, religious freedom, cultural rights, you will naturally have a stable society. naturally have a happy, relatively happy population. even though there some sort of political oppression exist, some people just willfully choose to look the other way about the political aspect. that was a life of the uyghur people. so i was able to speak my mother language, my native language which i still do. i i was able to enjoy cultural d religiousng life following my dd to go to mosque during religious

holidays were permitted. even if you do that today she will easily get a label, religious extremist. being state employee andth also under age child. those are the things that are very, very normal. also this may be news to most people, and i grew up in a university campus. we had some professors and they were respectful. even a small as not touching the food when they come to visit u your house and less the host invites them to do. that kind of basic respect has gone today. it's impossible to even see a parent taking a cue to a place of worship. it's gone. and also gather things that is so remarkable,em i saw a culturl revival, the first uyghur language publishing house was established by the state

publishing textbooks. today, those editors who either worked at the publishing house were editors, authors publish book to the publishing house are languishing in the camps. so it's just an incredibly different world. as i wrote in the book they carved out an area and an chinese elementary school to build a a mausoleum for one oe most significant intellectuals in the turkic history, and this person is known in entire eurasia. finally they organized preservationes, reorganizing of the uyghur classical music. if the chinese had what can we do to make it better? they should lookha at some of te policies that were working then because they had a little bit more reasonable leadership in

beijing that turned into a genocidal region. >> you were talking basically the 1980s. tell us what change along the way to bring us where we are today. >> the uyghur peopleea state, uyghur people's peoples environment always have someone related to thee global geopolitics regional geopolitics. the life was okay for the uyghur people even though there's a serious political repression. in the early '90s after the collapse of the soviet union after the gulf war and after the tiananmen square pro-democracy movement in beijing, i think china's leadershiplv promised himself will not have the same type ofov fate as the soviets ad we will not tolerate any type of political dissent. so domestic, june 4 pro-democracy movement in the late '90s, '80s, and then

the fall of the soviet union in neighboring turkey state declaring independence made the chinese nervous, as has been the case with the establishment of what was originally known as shanghai corporation, was established at the request of russiaia and china which is a regional security organization today. and then they just build up this pressure both inside and outside of china, created in any in the uyghur people. >> what is it that china, that the chinese communist party wants? >> two things. unconditional loyalty and subjugation. so the chinese communist party, uyghurs way of life, uyghur culture, identity, even the physical appearance something always been treated as a threat

or sign of disloyalty. the other has been part of the overall thinking in the leadership, state propaganda, and also even the society. i lived in england china for five years, four years in suburban and wonder in beijing. even with my student status and kind of gainful employment in beijing, i always treated as other even by cabdrivers. so there's a systematic racial profiling that stem from the concept initially created by, put out by social scientists and adopted by the ccp propaganda, now become social attitude. and the other piece is subjugation. the chinese trytr different methods from the beginning, since 1949. people should know that there was a country called east

turkestan before stalin handed over two-mile -- to mao, after the collapse of the government. so they tried different method, different ways, and then after xi jinpingpi took office or bece a supreme leader of china, the things take a dramatic change. they were initially very careful with the language. they always portray social stability, ethnic harmony type of propaganda to support national uyghur resentment. since 2015, 2017 the the narrative completely changed as you reported they use terms like no mercy, rounded up everyone should be rounded up. there's very little resentment within china. it's both state-sponsored,

social and racial profiling discriminationct that were partf the practice for a long time that codified and reinforced state policy in the last several years. challenges i feel like i faced in conveying what's happening in to the uyghurs is some of it is familiar alleys to western audience, religious ethnic minority in a concentration camp. a lot of it isn't, there isn't a simple way to explain the techno authoritarianism that people who are not in camps face, and the total surveillance state. use the term i think digital dictatorship, digital authoritarianism. maybe starting with the digital authoritarianism, if you can describe what that is, what it looks like him how it affects

the daily lives of uyghurs there and what it is for. >> we rightfully have been focusing on those have been detained in the camps, even based on the chinese own white paper. 1.3 million uyghurs went through reeducation since 2015. that's a staggering staggering number if you add them up. and these practices are still ongoing, but we often forget or ignore the life for the uyghurs outsideps of the camps who have been subject toee surveillance n there every aspect of their lives, iris scan, voice scan. this resulted in somethingng vey serious to the uyghur community around the world which was the family members made a conscious decision to delete the foreign contacts including children and grandchildren, even spouses

under contacts, worrying that when their walking down the street the mobile command machine, or the please, stop them and check, do a mobile device scan. if the data scan catch something as reported by human rights watch report, i gop, you will be profile. you will be able to be sent to police and you could be subject to reeducation as they call it. that's one piece. the other piece is that early on they had free medical checkup offering free medical checkup even for people who want health insurance like my parents. decent health insurance i might add, to collect dna samples, even one of the american medical scientists at yale medical school used the uyghur dna samples, with the help of

chinese minister of public, public security official at his lab here in the united states. and also the facial recognition software that also created such an impossible living environment. for example, if if you are go your parents house or relatives house, if you're not previous recorded in recognition database you will not be able to allow to go in. so imagine that every apartment complex have the type of doors that we see in new york metro station with cameras. so that's one piece. then the more recently they added qr code on your doors. so they know i can do people live there and what kind of activities, contacts they have. heso every aspect of the uyghur lives have been surveilled.le i think the most important thing

that i think people should take away from this part of the conversation is that toen the extent american public, american investors are investingst in china's technical author china's of not realizing this will be a bigger problem for the rest of the world to do with. as we speak there are more than countries around the world that only a stop at surveillance techniques but expanding it on their own. so this is something metastasizing that people should be concerned. because this will affect lives of millions of people when comes to privacy, especially in the united states as americans we love our privacy. this guide is intrusive surveillance may become a new norman of the part of the world. the other piece is what does that mean for democratic system, democratic freedom? are we going to allow ourselves to have a government or opposition group to monitor your

voting records? we may not have the problem here but around the world it may be the case. also the security concern. this is already been reported in the united states that commercialization of personal data without permission. we have actually this is already part of our lives here. there are many important aspect that people need to pay attention to. sometimes people think the chinese developed these techniques come surveillance technology, in sinjar. actually came from other parts of china. but only tested with its effectiveness now being exported. this is all part of china's global innovation using technology to expand their influence. i am very pleased and grateful for the training government focusing on chinese techne firm. this week there was a news about biden administration sanctioning

the world's largest camera maker, security chemical surveillance camera which has beenno enabling facilitating the ongoing genocide. >> there was chinese congressman back who came to the u.s. recently and part of his interesting and important testimony is he recognized the logo on the cameras that were in the mass internment camp that he was in. so that's real first-person evidence of the use of haec vision cameras in the camps and what they're for. of course with cnet through government tenders. we knew it would building to a so what else have you seen from the u.s. and maybe other countries that already happened and what you want to see that hasn't happened yet? >> i interviewed, had pleasure

interview the author of the book that everyone should read, we have been harmonized. he spent a lot of time in china, including a visit to xinjiang. after the news broke out that there's something bad happeningg he had something very interesting in the book which was that most of the u.s. hospitals, schools, prison systems use chinese security camera. this is already widespread in the united states. even in the book mentioned u.s. embassy in kabul now close, and one military base even in the united states using hikvision camera. the problem with this is that politicization. when those of us called attention to this tech authoritarianism, people politicize but never forget what

this entity is all about. in the same book there's also another interesting information that each of these companies have threat directly connected to the ccp leadership. that means their business model, the technology sharing, even certain degrees investment all connected to the ccp. in one instance the author mention, there's a slogan we will rule china today, we will rule the world tomorrow. so that's her ambition. >> quite a slogan, or a threat. >> it is a threat. the american people are gradually waking up because our government and bipartisan spirit doing something right about this particular issue. but i worry that the eastern and central european countries evene some western european countries are still a really appreciating

the magnitude, seriousness of the problem that we are dealing with. >> i want to get into some of the stories that you spent so much of your book on especially stories about women. you really get so much attention to what women have suffered. can you pick may be one or two of the women he wrote about and talk about what happened to them, especially as women, in the camp thatt also outside of the camps? >> i had the pleasure to work with the uyghur camp survivors. i could've interviewed all of them but because of the limited space that i will have on the book i only spoke with three. one is a camp instructor. she was assigned to teach to the detainees. most horrifying thing that i've heard from her was even at her

house that she was subject to various abuses, even at her house. >> is this the family? >> yes, this is has done is to send a group of chinese cadres to the homes of the uyghur people to eat and sleep uninvited. anyone can appreciate how annoyed, how offensive that can be if somebody comes to your house and tryed to join you in your bed y and join you in your meal. ndand importantly, using your on family to spite against you. children in this case.

this is still ongoing. ill interviewed another and she was also experienced, this become a family problem. u they call them relatives. they will check up on you. they come to talk to your children when you're not around and they can ask questions like what are you guys talk when we not at home? and honest answer by a child, children could cause a big trouble in some instances, could lend you into the camp. >> is it questions like have you seen mommy or daddy praying? >> praying here to the telly to do certain things when we are around? they have this thing called two-faced cricket also sexual violence that i've been hearing about, this is simply outrageous and heartbreaking. i profiled in the book that you specifically demand sexual favor

when they were part of when they come to stay. and the women who have no male household or husbands taken to the camps are the most vulnerable ones because they are based on the stories that it put on the book and based on of the conversation that i had with the camp survivors, this is still ongoing because some people may object to this description, but the uyghur women traditionally historically, societally perceived as as a sexual objn china. this is not only me saying, china embassy put out the tweet a year or so ago calling uyghur women as babymaking machine. after protested they took it down. the embassy can put out stuff like that to you can imagine what the social concept, the attitude could be to a vulnerable group of uyghur

women. the uyghur activists that i interviewed, the camp survivors reminded me of the jewish woman who survived the holocaust and shared their stories. i had the pleasure to work with some holocaust survivors here at home and the uk. it reminded me of those courageous women, tell the world. another important aspect that i think was a conversation. we talked about the cultural revolution reeducation program but today's collective punishment has some similarities to what the jewish people have gone through. for example, the forced labor. using the olympic to glorify the regime, taking children away, focusing, targeting women. there's so much even some off te slogans, you know, they use the term final solution in some of the chinese documents.

>> you talk about taking the childrenen away. that's a reference to some of the state-run orphanages where when both, one or both of the parents arere in the camps and there's a child, they put them iny there but they don't teach them weaker. they only teach them man drink. they teach them to say i love the communist party. there was an estimate in the "washington post" that there were --- >> 800,000. >> 800,000 t children. >> more than people in the nation's capital. a population in washington, d.c. is about 750. we're talking more kids than the population of washington, d.c. >> this has important international legal ramifications potentially. we can talk about creating the legal case that this is a genocide. i know under the rome statute the forcible removal, the transfer children from one group to another is itself alone enough to say that it's genocid

genocide. >> right. right. and the deliberate systematic prevention of natural population growth, that has also been documented. thed other pieces in part, thise whole destruction of a group of people. so the last two, the sterilization of population control and separate, child separation were some of the most important factors for the united states government, secretary pompeo initiallyll and then secretary blinken calling it a genocide. that i'd like to share a story. i was giving a talk at ucla law school, and this right around the time that the investigative reporting that you have done on the documents, a young m student came to me and asked me if i could help to save his sister. my question was natural, what happened to your sister?

he said that my mom was a very successful publisher. my dad was working with her and both of them are detained. recently my was transferred to a factory f to perform forced lab. i said would happen to your sister? he said she is with my aged, ailingng grandmother. if something happens to her and my sister will be sent to a state run orphanage. this is one of the many stories. then this american life profiled a father in istanbul who recognized his son in a state run orphanage propaganda material. this is one of the many cases that i personally heard, interact with. heart wrenching. what kind of people will take your children away from you? this sounds like a very basic human conversation but policymakers should ask

themselves what will happen to them if somebody take away their children from their wives, who end up recognizing in the video, a promotional video somewhere? and what if your children don't recognize you and calling somebody else father? so these kind of things keep me awake at night, specifically what happened to the uyghur women and children. what kind of future can have when you don't have women and children? it's very simple question. chinese authority, the policymakers, the architects know exactly what you're trying to accomplish. so it bothers me so much and personal level of whether this is genocide or not. >> there's a chinese government document or speec' refers to breaking the lineage, like cutting out the root. and breaking the lineage. this is the point, we don't want the next generation of uyghurs to be in a -- >> connection of uyghurs and roots.

that's the policy. that's a policy in china system. you don't have to have, like we do, the think tanks to get issues to study come to debate and that i have a congress to debate and there's no reporters to report. there's nothing, none of this is, if some chinese official slants the a slogan like that, it becomes policy. >> you talk about the forced sterilizationn,, and what, there is many horrifying aspects of that but some of it is truly pointless cruelty. the woman in the book. >> both of them. >> forty-eight years old, they both had to go, undergo a forced, surgical forced sterilization at that age. >> yes. still suffering serious health issues. she has been hospitalized a number of times. this is public. there are so s courageous, such

private matters, people don't casually talk about and even tuesday night going to see at bbc sharing a rape she experienced. this is all unusual circumstances but these brave women feel compelled to share these stories.ni in another case shows that even planning to have another baby and she was already close to 58, middle aged woman and they forced her to go through forced sterilization.ah it's cruel. >> yeah. i know that, so the u.s. has led a lot on this issue, and your work has been very important in that.. what are some the specific actions? we have talked about this already but there's been a genocide designation. there have been sanctions. there had been these technology companies put on the

entities list. there's also, we have hardly touched on this this in we, to talk about forced labor and supply chain issues and then the act that was passed recently, the uyghur forced labor prevention act. can you walk us through what is this forced labor, why is it happening, and what is the u.s. doing to try to get these products out of global supply chains? >> the issue is the very issue you raised makes this issue even more relatable, relevant to general american public or american people's interest, even pockets. the forced labor is that something new to the uyghur people. we talked about my early life. in the city, kashgar where i was born and raised, the chinese

authorities used uyghurs to perform forced labor in irrigation system picking cotton. cotton. so the cotton trade, picking cotton has been part of uyghur life for a long, long time. there's an entity called -- construction production, x pcc. the xtc controls much of the cotton fields, water resources and may have been enslaving the uyghur people and 4 the last 40, 50 years. this has been ongoing. what is new is a fact that this has become an industrial skilled practice in recent years. traditionally those global brands have their plant in coastal cities. and because of this alleviation program that people give chinese government a lot of credit for also created a labor shortage. a labor shortage compel some

businesses to move their assembly line to xinjiang. there's plenty of natural resources. they don't have to transport, plenty of agricultural products, and now the dirty coal that was used to build solar panels. and also its geographically convenientke location. if you have a market, if you want to have a market access to your asian there's over six and a miles international border, land access to your asian market. it's huge market. those are the reasons that they moved theirhe manufacturing site to that part of the country. what is new is that the uyghur forced labor has been use literally in everything. u including that ppe that we used to save lives even to this day, "new york times" reported that practice a couple of years ago.

i also the beauty products using uyghur women's hair, one shipment only. i asked my female friends to come up with a ballpark estimate how many women's and need to be shaved to make 13 tons of beauty products or weeks. no one can give me any accurate figure. that wasne only one shipment. >> you mentioned that the women in the camps had their heads shaved. >> yes. >> i know that particular shit came from a v factory that was very close to a detention facility. so the idea here is that this has such echoes of the holocaust. the women are put in the camps,i their heads are shaped and now that hair is being sold as profit. >> yes, and so is targeting african-american community calling it black gold and targeting an american woman with a darker hair preference. some of those, and in the solar

panel, my environmental friends always said wee need to save te planet. at what cost? so these are the things that are very new. i remember when i was in law school helping to edit workers manual from one of the sneaker makers who had a plan in northeast china. this is like a legit business. they were paid, even less than the others but now it's a full-scale industrial scale as slavery that we are dealing with. so the united states government for its credit done a lot of wr rose and now this legislation, i commend the leadership and u.s. congress and also president biden deserves some credit ford signing it inn such a short period of time. this piece of legislation become law literally in three weeks. took a u lot of time for us to t there but it was pretty quick. my being sanction has something to do with this as well.

>> i didn't know that. >> the time you come to look at the timing. three things happen around the time, the olympic boycott, the sanction and the signing of this law, bill into law or enactment of the uyghur forced prevention act. it's interesting time to say the least. what this law does is to push the responsibility over to the business to prove to the united states that they are not using forced labor, unless otherwise they will presume to be using forced labor. it's a smart strategy because in china there's an in force internal migration. even if you manage to stop your forced labor practices through legislation, legal means, legal tools, they can move it to a neighboring province. so with this kind of pushing the task over to the businesses i think it's one of the most effective ways. we shall see. this law is going to be, will go

into force, will be starting to be implement it next month, later, june 21 to tout be exact. but businesses may find a way to ask for a favor, -- waiver, exceptions because the business community still have been, community has not been going up to the plate yet. i'll give you one example. shortly after putin invaded ukraine it took about two or three days for the international businesses to either pull out or suspend their business practices. to this day,s if you count late 2016, it's been almost six years thate the advocates who tried to stop this practice have not been able to make one company u.s. company to make the pledge that they will not use or stop sourcing from xinjiang. one or a few of them tried and they end up being subjected to

state sponsored boycott in china. so this is a very complicated work but if this law is implemented it will address some of the lingering issues in the u.s.-china trade, since aegina joined the wto. and it don't think that, we will be able to solve the supply chain pump if you don't address this. sometime those businessho leades with lobbyists who pushing against tried trying to ce congress and the current administration that going hard on china on this particular issue will create more supply chain but we cannot handle something just pushing it to the side or cover o it up. this has to be dealt, and also i think this is also very important in the u.s.-eu relationship as well. i was pleased that matter was taken to g7, in the last g7.

they did not issue a joint communiqué but it was included in a a statement saying that we will push back against forced labor. i never thought the uyghur issue would make it to g7 conversation. conversation. so the europeans have not figured out that eu-china comprehensive agreement and investment is on hold. who knows what will happen to it, but i hope that the europeans, australians, the japanese, theja canadians, brits haveim something similar and ths will be a global effort. ii would like to otherwise we will not be able to stop this modern-day slavery. >> when i first heard this law, people are drafting it and putting it together i thought the idea behind it was really brilliant because at the time you talk to cbp, to the office, customs and border protection, the office that is tasked with preventing -- is already against the law for people to bring

products made with forced labor into the us but the onus on the time was on this tiny office that is totally understaffed, with these really complex supply chain audits you have to do with china and to put the onus on to the company. it makes it at least makes it theoretically possible to win a force of u.s. law that already exist. >> you raise an important point. not only within specific legal pools or mandate that would address this issue, we are so understaffed. our government agencies come talk about that particular office with about 15 people, the whole united states government has about 15 people who are tasked to do this. the united states remained to be the largest export destination for xinjiang products along with some european countries. >> they basically almost were not doing it. it will rely on media reports to do it for them which is understandable. that's a really great sign.

it's difficult to get a difficult because on the chinese side the chinese a government authorities have made it next to impossible to do actual audits on the ground audits. so anyway, whack-a-mole a little bit. >> absolutely. this is why i always emphasize the role of the consumers in the united states. you have to create an uncomfortable environment for both policymakers and business leaders, that they cannot just ignore. this isn't a case of the builder. even though there some reluctance in someal officials, even where we read there was some pushback and even some lobbying. the u.s. chamber of commerce to this day didn't think it was a good idea to have this law. so consumers need to create an environment that policymakers are forced to doo the right thig and also consumers could have a huge role to play to make it costly for the businesses to continue this modern-day slavery.

otherwise, what else? there's one example during the winter olympics. i don't know who promoted this idea initially, itt could be those threere jewish leaders who published an advertisement in "new york times" calling for a boycott of nbc viewership were watching the game. the viewership dropped half from then games. that's significant. i don't know what's going through the executive at nbc but it was a huge, that's a consumer activist role. people have a choice not to watch, not to buy things. >> i know one of fact of being labeled a genocide was that it was difficult for f advertisers, for brands to have as many come to an as many ads being so excited about the olympics because everyone knew that there was both there wase a genocide going on. >> speaking of that important

point, you remind me something, genocide olympic was sponsored by companies implicated already in the forest practices. it's not that difficult. some of them came to testify in congress. they would not even acknowledge their something bad happening iw that part of the world. it is used on constable. more importantly this is un-american because we have history, cotton trade history. this country has a history with slavery. t we have a history of not listening to people who are facing genocidal campaign. so if this does not wake up i don't know what will. and finally i wanted to remind something that the inaction by the state parties to the genocide convention, making this law, making this treaty almost irrelevant. as of 2019 i believe there are

over 150 state parties of the genocide convention. under the genocide convention, article one of the genocide convention state parties obliged to call itut out, stop and puni. so those eight countries and parliaments including our ownwn only didid what they are supposd to do as a as a baby step,r one. so nothing. i am very pleased with the progress that this caused it in particular were able to make in the united states, with zero financial investment. you know, passing these kind of major laws require a lot of resources and lobbying efforts. i am very pleased congress did this without anyone investing a teeny. also i am very please there's a bipartisan policy response by previous administration and the

current administration of what is missing is global. what is missing is of course human plan. i don't think anyone put out a plan to stop this genocide like the way that the international community came together try to push back against putin's invasion in ukraine. >> i remember what i found to be so incredibly disheartening although it was the appropriate action was when the international olympic committee, when russiaa invaded ukraine, called for countries to cancel sporting events with russia. this was coming off the heels with the beijing olympics once only people have been urging the ioc to take action regarding china's genocide and they had been totally silent. it was theti juxtaposition of tt was very hard to see. >> at the u.n. secretary-general went to ukraine and set all the right thing and to this day has

not set a single thing. mentioned,ever that's right. >> so the hypocrisy is that display. >> that transition into the last thing i want to talk about which is the global implications of the uyghur genocide. the uyghur genocide matters no matter what. that dignity of the uyghur people survival of the weaker people is important enough for everyone in the world to care about but because of china's position in their ability to reshape the chinese communist party's desire to reshape global institutions, it has even added weight in terms of what kind of world the 21st century is going to be. what are the ways that the chinese government has been trying to come i don't know, make the world safe for authoritarianism, make the world safe for genocide for whoever wants to commit it? >> that's an important question that everyone should be talking about. as i alluded earlier, one might

think these horrific experiences thatge the uyghurs have gone through is another human rights headaches, another human rights problem. i think people are mistaken. it was a human rights concern about five or six years ago but now what the ccp doing is doing is touching every aspect of our lives, whether it be a moral obligation, historical concerns of regrets, technological aspect ofof our lives or the products that we use at home, or global leadership, health of our democratic system, our privacy. anything that we touch tow relates to the uyghur genocide. so i don't, one of the things i want people to take away from reading my book is to feel, hopefully, that this is not only

about the uyghursan anymore. this is about the future. so if theis chinese gets away wh this, then this will become a new normal. i personally think this is too much of a problem for the world. in the last ten years i'm very critical of our international system. there's no one that we can go and get this address through international organization entities today. just last ten l years alone we'e seen three genocidal campaigns.d the dvds first and then the rohingya and then the uyghurs. united states government recognize the last two as a genocide. but what is the action? so if you let this go, if they suffer no cost, reputational or otherwise, we will see this again. but if you stop this, the historical promise never again,

the treaty obligation, moral obligation, what better place for the next future can be? i think this is about leadership. this is about conscience. this is about future pick this is about compassion. the quote i put up at my also freedom speech i think it's a good way to remind the audience, people sometimes feel indifferent. it's too remote, unrelated, different religious group, different ethniceo group or the fact that the jewish people feel so attached to this cost today is because they have seen how it ends. you may think another muslim people, too far, we're central asia, but at the end of day when it happens to you you may not have people to speak for you. i hope this book will compel policymakers, ordinary citizens

to do whatever they can lending their voices, initiating new responses, putting in place legal tools. journalist like yourself, even at a personal cost, you are a great example of china going after individuals simply for doing their job. to do the right thing for a better future. >> i think that's a perfect place to end. nury, thank you for your time today and thank t you for this book andnd the work that you hae done and continue to do on this topic, and thank you to all of you for joining us today here at hudson. >> middle and high school students it's your time to shine. you are invited to participate in this year's cspan's studentcam documentary competition. in light of the upcoming midterm election picture yourself as a newly elected member of congress. we ask what is your top priority and why?

make a five to six minute video that shows the importance of your issues from opposing and supporting perspective. don't be afraid to take risks with your documentary. be bold. amongst the $100,000 in cash prizes is a $5000 grand prize. videos must be submitted by january 20, 2023. visit our website at studentcam.org for competition rules, tips, resources and a step-by-step guide. >> if you are enjoying booktv then sign up for our newsletter using the qr code on the screen to receive the schedule upcoming programs can offer discussions, festivals and more. booktv every sunday on c-span2 or anytime online at booktv.org. television for serious readers. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these

television companies and more including comcast. >> are you thinking this is just a committee center? it's way more the net. >> comcast is partnering with 1000 community centers to create wi-fi enabled lift zones so students can get the tools they need to be ready for anything. >> comcast support c-span as a public service along with these other television providers give you a front row seat to democracy. >> good afternoon, everyone. i am the chief communications officer for the library of congress and because we can't say this of on behalf of my wonderful colleagues welcome to the 20222 library of congress national book festival. it's great to see the huge crowd here on the stage. thank yougr again. [applause] and if you missed any of the office today please go to the webmac and youan can catch up wh some of our not marvelous authors is the part of the festival. we got a