Twitter removes 'dehumanising' Chinese embassy tweet on Uighur women

The tweet, posted on Thursday, drew widespread condemnation for claiming that Uighur women have had their minds "emancipated" and are no longer "baby-making machines".

"We prohibit the dehumanization of a group of people based on their religion, race, or ethnicity, among other categories," a Twitter spokesperson told Ars Technica. 

China's embassy promoted on Thursday a study in state-run media that claimed that the birth rate declined in 2018 among Uighur women, as they increasingly accepted contraceptive measures due to the "eradication of religious extremism".

The tweet read: "Study shows that in the process of eradicating extremism, the minds of Uygur women in Xinjiang were emancipated and gender equality and reproductive health were promoted, making them no longer baby-making machines. They are more confident and independent. "

It garnered instant backlash, as activists urged the social media platform to remove the tweet, which celebrated  crimes against humanity.

"Interesting way to brag about carrying out genocide," writer CJ Werlman responded to the embassy's tweet before it was removed.

"China can't even hide its genocidal contempt for Uyghur Muslim women in dehumanising them as 'baby making machines'," said Werlman, who is a contributor to The New Arab.

Read more: 'Demographic genocide': China forces birth control on Uighurs to suppress Muslim population

Researcher Jasmin Mujanovic echoed those remarks, tweeting: "This is what genocide denial sounds like in real time."

"China just admitted to forcibly sterilising our women," Uighur activist Aydin Anwar said.

Journalist Owen Hughes chimed in: "If Twitter had existed in the 1940s it's the sort of thing Nazi Germany would have been tweeting."

"Why does witter allow their platform to be used for this kind of propaganda? They are bragging about the Genocide of Muslims," wrote Canadian Senator Leo Housakos.

Rights groups say more than one million Uighurs and other mostly Muslim people in China's northwestern region of Xinjiang have been incarcerated in camps in a bid to root out Islamic customs and forcibly integrate minorities.

China insists it is offering vocational training to reduce the allure of extremism in the wake of deadly attacks.

A study by German researcher Adrian Zenz last year found that China had forcibly sterilised large numbers of Uighur women and pressured them to abort pregnancies that exceeded birth quotas.

Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to stay connected