H. Res. 317 
In the House of Representatives, U. S., 
December 8, 2021. 
Whereas, on December 9, 1948, the United Nations General 
Assembly unanimously adopted the Convention on the 
Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide 
(the Genocide Convention) signifying a commitment in 
response to the Holocaust and other crimes against hu-
manity committed in the first half of the twentieth cen-
tury; 
Whereas the Genocide Convention entered into force on Janu-
ary 12, 1951, and declares that all state parties ‘‘confirm 
that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in 
time of war, is a crime under international law which 
they undertake to prevent and to punish’’; 
Whereas the Genocide Convention defines genocide as ‘‘any 
of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in 
whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious 
group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) 
Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the 
group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions 
of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction 
in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to 
prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring 
children of the group to another group’’;
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Whereas the United States ratified the Genocide Convention 
with the understanding that the commission of genocide 
requires ‘‘the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in 
substantial part, a [protected] group as such’’; 
Whereas the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is a state 
party to the Genocide Convention; 
Whereas, since 2017, the PRC Government, under the direc-
tion and control of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), 
has detained and sought to indoctrinate more than one 
million Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and reli-
gious minority groups; 
Whereas recent data indicate a significant drop in birth rates 
among Uyghurs due to enforced sterilization, enforced 
abortion, and more onerous birth quotas for Uyghurs 
compared to Han; 
Whereas there are credible reports of PRC Government cam-
paigns to promote marriages between Uyghurs and Han 
and to reduce birth rates among Uyghurs and other 
Turkic Muslims; 
Whereas many Uyghurs reportedly have been assigned to fac-
tory employment under conditions that indicate forced 
labor, and some former detainees have reported food dep-
rivation, beatings, suppression of religious practices, fam-
ily separation, and sexual abuse; 
Whereas this is indicative of a systematic effort to eradicate 
the ethnic and cultural identity and religious beliefs, and 
prevent the births of, Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs and 
Kyrgyz, and members of religious minority groups; 
Whereas the birth rate in the Xinjiang region fell by 24 per-
cent in 2019 compared to a 4.2 percent decline nation-
wide;
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Whereas, on January 19, 2021, the Department of State de-
termined the PRC Government, under the direction and 
control of the CCP, has committed crimes against hu-
manity and genocide against Uyghurs and other ethnic 
and religious minority groups in Xinjiang; 
Whereas Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Former Sec-
retary of State Michael Pompeo have both stated that 
what has taken place in Xinjiang is genocide and con-
stitutes crimes against humanity; 
Whereas Article VIII of the Genocide Convention provides, 
‘‘Any Contracting Party may call upon the competent or-
gans of the United Nations to take such action under the 
Charter of the United Nations as they consider appro-
priate for the prevention and suppression of acts of geno-
cide’’; 
Whereas the International Court of Justice has stated that 
it is the obligation of all state parties to the Genocide 
Convention to ‘‘employ all means reasonably available to 
them, so as to prevent genocide so far as possible’’; and 
Whereas the United States is a Permanent Member of the 
United Nations Security Council: Now, therefore, be it 
Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 
(1) finds that the ongoing abuses against Uyghurs 
and members of other ethnic and religious minority 
groups constitute genocide as defined in the Genocide 
Convention and crimes against humanity as understood 
under customary international law; 
(2) attributes these atrocity crimes against Uyghurs 
and members of other ethnic and religious minority
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groups to the People’s Republic of China, under the di-
rection and control of the Chinese Communist Party; 
(3) condemns this genocide and these crimes 
against humanity in the strongest terms; and 
(4) calls upon the President to direct the United 
States Permanent Representative to the United Nations 
to use the voice, vote, and influence of the United States 
to— 
(A) refer the People’s Republic of China’s 
genocide and crimes against humanity against 
Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious 
minority groups to the competent organs of the 
United Nations for investigation; 
(B) seize the United Nations Security Council 
of the circumstances of this genocide and crimes 
against humanity and lead efforts to invoke multi-
lateral sanctions in response to these ongoing atroc-
ities; and 
(C) take all possible actions to bring this geno-
cide and these crimes against humanity to an end