Uyghur Families Are Being Denied Religious Burials During COVID-19 Lockdown

Theresa Erna Jürgenssen

East Asia Human Rights Researcher

Global Human Rights Defence

Several Uyghur families have been deprived of the possibility to bury their deceased loved ones according to their religious practices and traditions. The bodies of the deceased - who died during a Covid-19 lockdown in Ghulja - were collected by the authorities in Xinjiang. The latter did not allow the families to wash the bodies of the people who died before burial and failed to inform them of what happened to the bodies upon collection. 

Ghulja is a city situated in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and has been under strict lockdown since August, resulting in numerous deaths inter alia from starvation, lack of access to medicine or medical services, and lack of Uyghur-language emergency services. This situation is another example of China’s zero-Covid policy, which has been taking a toll on everyone living in China and resulted in numerous lockdowns across the country. 

It is custom for Uyghurs to wash their deceased’s bodies before burial and to bury them in accordance with Islamic practices. Not only were the families denied the possibility to bury their loved ones themselves, but they have so far not received any information as to what had happened to the bodies collected by the authorities.  

Pursuant to Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights “everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion”, which includes the right to “manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance”. Religious burial practices are an important element to many religions and are, as such, protected by Article 18. In addition, China has an obligation under Article 15 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to recognize the right of everyone to take part in cultural life. 

While it may be acceptable to take certain Covid-19 measures in relation to burials, such as restricting public gatherings, such restrictions should generally be necessary and proportional and must not be applied in a discriminatory manner. Indeed, public health measures should take religious minorities into consideration and, where it fails to do so, may be considered to discriminate against them (Kelly, 2020). In fact, Covid-19 policies have previously been found to have discriminated against Muslim communities, for instance, in Sri Lanka, including in relation to burial practices (Kelly, 2020). 

Even in the light of public health concerns, there are possibilities for the authorities to respect the Muslim burial practices. These could include, for instance:

• Permitting intimate family burials;
• Allowing families to prepare the deceased’s bodies in accordance with their religion before the bodies are collected by the authorities; or
• For the authorities themselves to bury the deceased in accordance with the religious customs themselves and then inform the families accordingly. 

In light of the authorities’ failure to take such measures, the lack of consideration given to the religious practices in the Covid-19 policies could be considered an interference with the right to freedom of religion as well as the right to culture. 

In addition, under Article 11 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights China must recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living, which includes the right to access to adequate food, clothing and housing. China could be considered to have violated this right in relation to the extreme Covid-19 measures it has taken and the imposition of such strict lockdowns that inter alia result in starvation. 

Sources and further reading:

Hoshur, S. (2022, November 2). Authorities in Xinjiang collect bodies of Uyghurs who died during COVID lockdown. Radio Free Asia. Retrieved on November 3, 2022, from https://www.rfa.org/english/news/uyghur/ritual-burials-11022022133359.html. 

Kelly, L. (2020, November 6). Covid 19 and the rights of members of belief minorities. K4D Helpdesk Report. Retrieved on November 3, 2022, from https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/bitstream/handle/20.500.12413/15891/908_covid_and_religious_minorities.pdf?sequence=3.