China employing boarding schools as tool of cultural genocide against Uyghur children

The Centre for Uyghur Studies (CUS) has released a report titled “Breaking the Roots: China’s Use of Boarding Schools as a Tool of Genocide Against Uyghur Muslims,” The Sentinel revealed. The report sheds light on China’s state-sponsored boarding school system targeting Uyghur children in East Turkistan, also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. It describes these schools not as educational institutions but as mechanisms of cultural genocide aimed at erasing Uyghur identity, language, and culture from a young age.

CUS traces the origins of China’s assimilation policies to post-9/11 narratives of “counter-terrorism,” which have been used to justify oppressive measures against the Uyghurs. For centuries, the Uyghur people have maintained a distinct cultural and ethnic identity, but under Chinese Communist Party rule, their existence faces severe threats through mass Han Chinese migration, internment camps, and now coercive boarding schools.

The report details how children, some as young as primary school age, are forcibly removed from their families and placed in state-run boarding schools. Within these institutions, speaking the Uyghur language is banned, familial bonds are undermined, and loyalty to the state is enforced. Eyewitness accounts from survivors reveal the profound psychological and cultural damage inflicted on Uyghur youth.

Many parents, often detained themselves, are unable to communicate with or receive information about their children. According to CUS, these boarding schools systematically strip Uyghur children of their heritage, language, and religious faith, deepening concerns over cultural genocide.