Uyghur SOS Act
Bill: H.R.3306 | Sponsor: Rep. Hartzler, Vicky (R-MO)
Policy area: International Affairs

Summary:
Uyghur Stop Oppressive Sterilizations Act or the Uyghur SOS Act
This bill expands existing visa-blocking sanctions to cover certain high-ranking foreign government officials who are responsible for coercive population control policies, such as forced abortions, with a focus on those responsible for such policies against ethnic minority groups in China.
Specifically, the Department of State may not issue a visa to a foreign national who is a head of state, head of government, or cabinet-level minister and responsible for establishing or enforcing such policies if the policies are (1) imposed with the intent to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group; or (2) targeting ethnic minority groups (e.g., Uyghurs, Kazakhs, or Tibetans) or individuals peacefully expressing internationally-recognized human rights in China. (Currently, these sanctions do not apply to any foreign government officials at these higher ranks.)
The State Department must make a public announcement each time sanctions are imposed under this bill.
The bill also requires the State Department to provide all appropriate assistance to women who belong to an ethnic minority group in China and who have experienced sexual violence, torture, or coercive population control policies.

To address state-sanctioned violence against women in the People's 
 Republic of China, including rape and torture in detention and forced 
sterilizations, forced abortions, and other coercive birth restriction 
 policies, particularly in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and 
                          for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Uyghur Stop Oppressive 
Sterilizations Act'' or the ``Uyghur SOS Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) Eyewitness accounts provide credible documentation of 
        widespread forced sterilization and sexual violence against 
        Uyghur and Kazakh women in the People's Republic of China, 
        including investigations and independent interviews by global 
        media outlets.
            (2) Women who survived internment camps report that they 
        were forced to undergo multiple injections of unknown medicines 
        that caused temporary or permanent loss of menstrual cycles.
            (3) Chinese Government documents demonstrate rapid declines 
        in population in two predominately Uyghur prefectures of the 
        Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region between 2015 and 2018, and an 
        unprecedented near-zero birth rate target for 2020 in one 
        district. Government documents mandate that birth control 
        violations are punishable by extrajudicial internment in 
        ``training'' camps.
            (4) Chinese Government documents from 2019 reveal plans for 
        a campaign of mass female sterilization in rural Uyghur 
        populated regions of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, to 
        be continued in 2020 with increased funding. Publicly available 
        budgets indicate that this project had sufficient funding to 
        perform hundreds of thousands of tubal ligation sterilization 
        procedures in 2019 and 2020.
            (5) In 2019, the Government of the Xinjiang Uyghur 
        Autonomous Region planned to subject at least 80 percent of 
        women of childbearing age in the four southern, rural, minority 
        prefectures to intrusive birth-prevention surgeries.
            (6) A leaked report written by Nankai University 
        researchers for the Chinese Government confirms the intent of 
        intention of state-organized forced labor transfers as having 
        the ultimate purpose of assimilating Uyghurs, ``breaking up'' 
        their society, and altering demographic trends.
            (7) The policy of state-sponsored forced population-
        transfer program, which separates married couples and forcibly 
        places unmarried individuals into controlled environments where 
        they cannot marry or form a family, is a violation of the 
        fundamental right ``to marry and to found a family,'' as 
        codified by Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human 
        Rights (1948).
            (8) Under the ``becoming family'' homestay program 
        initiated by the government of the People's Republic of China 
        in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, government workers 
        and other Communist Party members are assigned to live with 
        ethnic minority families in their homes to conduct surveillance 
        and compile information on family members, in arrangements 
        which leave these families vulnerable to sexual violence and 
        other types of abuse.
            (9) On January 7, 2021, an official social media account 
        for the Government of China said that a ``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 [and] . . . . They are more confident and 
        independent.''.
            (10) Uyghur and Kazakh women who have given testimony to 
        reporters about sexual violence and forced sterilizations in 
        mass internment camps have been intimidated and their families 
        threatened by security officials from the People's Republic of 
        China.
            (11) Article Two of the Genocide Convention of 1948, which 
        China has signed and ratified, states that ``genocide means 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.''.
            (12) On January 19, 2021, the Secretary of State released a 
        determination about atrocities in the Xinjiang Uyghur 
        Autonomous Region that stated that the ``ongoing'' crimes 
        against humanity against the predominantly Muslim Uyghurs and 
        other members of ethnic and religious minority groups include 
        forced sterilization, and called upon the PRC ``immediately to 
        release all arbitrarily detained persons and abolish its system 
        of internment, detention camps, house arrest and forced labor; 
        cease coercive population control measures, including forced 
        sterilizations, forced abortion, forced birth control, and the 
        removal of children from their families; and end all torture 
        and abuse in places of detention . . . .''
            (13) That same determination concluded that, after careful 
        examination of the facts, the Government of China was 
        committing ``genocide'' against Uyghur, Kazakh, and other 
        ethnic minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
        Region.
            (14) Secretary of State Tony Blinken affirmed that the 
        United States Government recognizes the atrocities faced by 
        Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in the 
        Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region as ongoing genocide and 
        crimes against humanity and said the United States will hold 
        the Government of China responsible for the ``atrocities'' 
        committed in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.

SEC. 3. STATEMENT OF POLICY.

    It is the policy of the United States--
            (1) to regard the prevention of genocide and other atrocity 
        crimes as a national interest particularly when those actions 
        target Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and Kyrgyz and other predominately 
        Muslim ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
        Region through mass arbitrary detentions, forced labor, forced 
        sterilizations, forced abortions and other coercive birth 
        restrictions policies, sexual violence and other torture in 
        detention, and forced transfer of children to orphanages and 
        boarding schools;
            (2) to condemn genocide and work diplomatically to end 
        genocide and other atrocity crimes, including by calling on 
        foreign governments, through both bilateral discussions and in 
        multilateral organizations, to denounce and take actions to end 
        the atrocity crimes perpetuated in the Xinjiang Uyghur 
        Autonomous Region;
            (3) to raise the issue of state-sanctioned violence against 
        women, including rape, torture, and coercively enforced 
        population control policies in the People's Republic of China, 
        in all multilateral organizations where the United States and 
        the People's Republic of China are members, including at the 
        United Nations Security Council;
            (4) to consider state-sanctioned violence against women, 
        including forced sterilizations and forced abortions and the 
        systematic use of rape and torture in mass internment camps in 
        the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region as a gross violation of 
        internationally-recognized human rights; and
            (5) to use all the existing United States authorities, 
        including visa and financial sanctions, to hold accountable 
        individuals and entities responsible for genocide and other 
        atrocity crimes in the People's Republic of China, section 6 of 
        the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act (Public Law No: 116-145) and 
        including section 1263 of the Global Magnitsky Human Rights 
        Accountability Act (subtitle F of title XII of the National 
        Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017; 22 U.S.C. 2656 
        note).

SEC. 4. SENSE OF CONGRESS CONCERNING ATROCITY CRIMES IN THE XINJIANG 
              UYGHUR AUTONOMOUS REGION.

    It is the sense of Congress that--
            (1) the atrocities perpetrated by the Government of the 
        People's Republic of China against Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, 
        and other predominately Muslim ethnic minorities in the 
        Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region are horrific and ongoing and 
        constitute genocide and crimes against humanity;
            (2) all governments, including the United States, and 
        international organizations, such as the United Nations and the 
        Office of the Secretary-General, should call the atrocities 
        perpetuated by the Government of the People's Republic of 
        China, including the mass arbitrary detention of ethnic 
        minorities; forced sterilizations and forced abortions and 
        other sexual violence; and forced labor, as genocide and crimes 
        against humanity;
            (3) the United States, in coordination with allies and 
        partners, should strongly condemn the intimidation and threats 
        targeting Uyghur and Kazakh women who provide public evidence 
        of sexual violence and forced sterilizations and forced 
        abortions in mass internment camps and the journalist who 
        report these stories;
            (4) member states of the United Nations should consider all 
        Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities detained and imprisoned 
        through the justice system in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
        Region as arbitrarily detained due to the severe restrictions 
        on information regarding the cases and because research by 
        human rights organizations indicate that long prison sentences 
        were given to individuals for practicing their religion or 
        engaging in other internationally-recognized human rights;
            (5) member states of the United Nations should condemn the 
        atrocities committed by the Government of the People's Republic 
        China, including forced sterilizations and other state-
        sanctioned violence against women, and take steps to prevent 
        further crimes against humanity and genocide in the Xinjiang 
        Uyghur Autonomous Region including by demanding that the 
        Government of the People's Republic of China--
                    (A) immediately adhere to its commitments under the 
                Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the 
                Crime of Genocide;
                    (B) end all forced sterilization, forced abortions, 
                and other state-sanctioned violence against women;
                    (C) release all individuals from internment camps, 
                and all others who are unjustly or arbitrarily 
                detained, including those engaged in forced labor 
                programs or separated from their families in state-run 
                boarding schools;
                    (D) end harassment and restrictions on foreign 
                journalists while they are traveling in the Xinjiang 
                Uyghur Autonomous Region and immediately end any 
                threats and intimidation directed at journalists for 
                reporting about conditions there; and
                    (E) guarantee the right to the freedom of religion, 
                including by rebuilding mosques and restoring holy 
                sites and cemeteries;
            (6) member states of the United Nations should take action 
        to collect and preserve evidence of genocide and crimes against 
        humanity and establish appropriate special mechanisms and 
        tribunals to hold accountable officials responsible for 
        genocide and crimes against humanity, including through the 
        establishment of an international Commission on Inquiry on 
        Atrocity Crimes in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region; and
            (7) the Department of State should be commended for raising 
        the issue of atrocity crimes and its public determination that 
        the Government of the People's Republic of China is responsible 
        for an ongoing genocide and for crimes against humanity in the 
        Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.

SEC. 5. STRATEGY TO ADDRESS GENOCIDE IN THE XINJIANG UYGHUR AUTONOMOUS 
              REGION.

    (a) Finding.--Congress finds that--
            (1) the determination of the Secretary of State that the 
        Government of the People's Republic of China is responsible for 
        perpetrating both genocide and crimes against humanity 
        targeting Uyghurs and other predominately Muslim ethnic 
        minority groups in Xinjiang Uyghurs Autonomous Region is an 
        issue on which there is widespread bipartisan support in 
        Congress; and
            (2) the atrocities being committed in China are both 
        horrific and ongoing.
    (b) Strategy Required.--Not later than 60 days after the date of 
the enactment of this Act, the President shall submit to the 
appropriate congressional committees a report that includes a strategy 
specifically describing--
            (1) the steps already taken to tangibly address atrocity 
        crimes occurring in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, 
        especially during the period following the January 19, 2021, 
        determination that genocide and crimes against humanity were 
        occurring in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region; and
            (2) a strategy for ending the atrocity crimes occurring in 
        the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, including by--
                    (A) holding accountable persons or entities 
                responsible for committing such atrocity crimes by 
                addressing, through existing or new export controls or 
                import restrictions, the issues of mass biometric 
                surveillance and forced labor programs in China;
                    (B) gaining access for United Nations, United 
                States, and other diplomats and foreign journalists to 
                the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region; and
                    (C) protecting Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other 
                ethnic minorities affected by the atrocities committed 
                by the Government of the People's Republic of China.
    (c) Form and Publication.--The report required under subsection (b) 
shall be submitted in unclassified form and shall be made publicly 
available, but may include a classified annex.
    (d) Appropriate Congressional Committees.--In this section, the 
term ``appropriate congressional committees'' means--
            (1) The Committee on Foreign Affairs, the Committee on 
        Armed Services, and the Committee on Appropriations of the 
        House of Representatives.
            (2) The Committee on Foreign Relations, the Committee on 
        Armed Services, and the Committee on Appropriations of the 
        Senate.

SEC. 6. PROTECTION OF UYGHURS, KAZAKHS, AND OTHER ETHNIC MINORITIES IN 
              THE XINJIANG UYGHUR AUTONOMOUS REGION.

    The Secretary of State shall provide all appropriate assistance to 
women who belong to the Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, or other ethnic 
minority and who experienced sexual violence, torture, forced 
sterilizations and forced abortions in the People's Republic of China 
in order for them to receive needed medical care and psychological 
support. All existing authorities shall be used to allow such women to 
at least temporarily enter the United States.

SEC. 7. SANCTIONS WITH RESPECT TO INDIVIDUALS COMMITTING RESPONSIBLE 
              FOR OR COMPLICIT IN FORCED STERILIZATIONS, FORCED 
              ABORTIONS, OR OTHER SEXUAL VIOLENCE.

    (a) Statement of Policy.--It is the policy of the United States to 
consider any foreign person or entity responsible for, complicit in, or 
having directly or indirectly engaged in forced sterilizations, forced 
abortions, or other sexual violence targeting any individual in the 
Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region as having committed gross violations 
of internationally recognized human rights for purposes of imposing the 
sanctions detailed in the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability 
Act (subtitle F of title XII of the National Defense Authorization Act 
for Fiscal Year 2017; 22 U.S.C. 2656 note).
    (b) Denial of Entry for Foreign Nationals Engaged in Establishment 
or Enforcement of Forced Abortion or Sterilization Policy.--Section 801 
of the Admiral James W. Nance and Meg Donovan Foreign Relations 
Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 2000 and 2001 (Public Law 106-113; 8 
U.S.C. 1182e) is amended--
            (1) in subsection (b), by striking ``minister.'' and 
        inserting ``minister, unless--
            ``(1) the Secretary of State makes a public determination 
        that the forced sterilizations, forced abortions, or other 
        coercive population control policies were being committed or 
        enforced with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a 
        national, ethnic, racial or religious group and therefore 
        constitute genocide or crimes against humanity; or
            ``(2) the Secretary of State finds that such coercive 
        population control policies were targeting Uyghurs, Kazakhs, 
        Tibetan or other ethnic minorities or individuals peacefully 
        expressing internationally-recognized human rights in the 
        People's Republic of China.'';
            (2) in subsection (c), by striking ``national interest'' 
        and inserting ``national security interest''; and
            (3) by adding at the end the following new subsections:
    ``(d) Notice.--The Secretary of State shall make a public 
announcement each time sanctions are imposed under this section as a 
result of a determination or finding described in subsection (b)(1) or 
(b)(2), respectively.
    ``(e) Information Requested by Congress.--The Secretary of State 
shall, upon request of a Member of Congress--
            ``(1) provide information about the use of the sanctions 
        described in this section, including the number of times 
        imposed, disaggregated by country and by year; or
            ``(2) provide a classified briefing that includes 
        information about the individuals or entities sanctioned 
        pursuant to this section and any other Act authorizing 
        sanctions with respect to the conduct of such individuals or 
        entities.''.
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