Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) has introduced new legislation aimed at halting the supply of U.S. genetic technology to China due to concerns that it could be used by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to violate human rights.
Mr. Rubio said the Stopping Genetic Monitoring by China Act would stop the Chinese regime from using American genetic technology and “send a clear message that we will not tolerate China’s abuse of human rights.”
This came just a month after Mr. Rubio introduced the Genomics Expenditures and National Security Enhancement (GENE) Act to counter the CCP’s threat to collect Americans’ genomic data.
“China not only steals genetic data from Americans but also conducts biomedical research and represses its own people using genetic technology,” Mr. Rubio said in a press release on July 26.
“This includes forcefully taking genetic information from Uyghurs, Tibetans, and other ethnic groups as a ‘crime-fighting’ measure. Beijing relies on American companies for genetic technology,” he added.
The new legislation would add genetic sampling and testing kits, analytical technology, and software to the U.S. Bureau of Industry and Security’s Commerce Control List, according to his statement.
“America has no business aiding China’s crimes against humanity. We cannot allow Beijing to continue to use our technology to violate the human rights of its own people,” the lawmaker added.
A perimeter fence is constructed around what is officially known as a vocational skills education center in Dabancheng in Xinjiang Uyghur region, China, on Sept. 4, 2018. (Thomas Peter/Reuters)
China has used “combating extremism” as a pretext for locking up more than 1 million Uyghurs in Xinjiang, where detainees are subjected to forced labor, torture, political indoctrination, forced abortion, and other inhuman treatment in the regime’s internment camps.
Some U.S. lawmakers had urged the extension of tougher American export restrictions to prevent sales of equipment that could be used in China’s massive security clampdown targeting the Xinjiang region’s minorities.
In February 2019, U.S.-based company Thermo Fisher Scientific said it would stop selling genetic sequencers in Xinjiang amid criticism that they were used for surveillance that enabled human rights abuses, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Thermo Fisher faced criticism from human rights groups and U.S. lawmakers for supplying the equipment used to identify individuals in Xinjiang.
China Rejects Allegations Of Rights Abuse
The CCP has referred to the camps as “vocational skills education centers” and denied operating the system of camps, despite extensive documentation from those interned and relatives and other evidence such as satellite photos and government documents.
During a hearing at the United Nations Human Rights Office on Feb. 15, a Chinese delegation rejected all charges of human rights abuses and said the barbed wire and surveillance cameras at the Xinjiang “reeducation” camps were put in place for safety reasons.
“Training centers were not detention centers. Schools and offices also had barbed wire and fences; these were safety measures,” the delegation said, according to the U.N. transcript.
In 2021, the Trump and the Biden administrations formally declared China’s treatment of the Uyghur minority ethnic group as “genocide” and “crimes against humanity.” Several countries have followed suit, including Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, and the Netherlands.
Frank Fang and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
