The Chinese Communist Party has forcibly collected DNA data using reasons such as “combating crime.” Beginning in 2016, the authorities in Xinjiang had massive collections of DNA samples from ethnic Muslims to establish databases for the purpose of surveillance and suppression. Now this practice has extended to the whole country. The regime is collecting DNA and other biological information on a large scale. All males, even elementary and middle school boys, are included and have not been spared.
In November, people from multiple cities in Guangxi Province told the Bitter Winter magazine, an Italian based publication focusing China’s religious freedom and human rights, that local police were collecting blood samples from elementary and middle school boys without notifying their parents. When asked for the reason, some teachers explained that it was to prevent children from being trafficked or lost, but they failed to explain why they were collecting only from boys but not from girls.
Bitter Winter obtained a document that the Public Security Bureau of Chongren County in Jiangxi Province issued in November. The document required the local Education and Sports Bureau to cooperate with the police to collect information on all male students in elementary and middle schools. The document stated that this work was carried out nationwide to collect information for the nation’s seventh population census, to issue third-generation digital ID cards, to improve the dissemination of population data, and to facilitate rapid identity verification.
Chinese media also reported that police have collected blood from male adult citizens for a number of reasons such as “free medical examinations” and “checking for drug abuse.”
A “Y-STR DNA Database Construction Work Plan Notice” that a county government in Hubei Province issued in September 2018 called for “the establishment of a male-dominated pedigree information database that comprehensively covered the rural areas,” and “through investigation of the family tree to maintain the social order and strengthen the ability to control the population.”
The Chinese government often uses the collected DNA data to suppress dissidents and religious believers. In July 2019, the police harassed the parents of a believer in the Church of Almighty God and forcibly collected blood samples.
Source: Bitter Winter, January 3, 2020