This month the Chinese Communist Party celebrated the 70th anniversary of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, or XPCC, a massive CCP-backed paramilitary group that functions as an armed force, corporate conglomerate and government administrative unit.
China's vice premier, He Lifeng, traveled to Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, to join the festivities, which included a performance by dancers holding replicas of giant vegetables to symbolize the bounty XPCC has brought to the region through land reclamation projects. He and other CCP officials praised the corps for protecting China's western border and promoting social stability and called for the group to take an even more expansive role in Xinjiang's development.
That won’t come as welcome news to XPCC’s critics who assert that gains ascribed to the corps have come at the expense of Uyghurs and other ethnic Turkic communities indigenous to Xinjiang. They allege the XPCC’s economic development has relied on land expropriation, forced labor and extrajudicial detentions that have drawn international condemnation.
"In the last five years in particular, the XPCC has played a critical role in suppressing Uyghur life, culture and identity," a highly critical 2022 report from researchers at Sheffield Hallam University in the United Kingdom said.
The conglomerate is under sanctions by the U.S. Treasury. Cotton imports from Xinjiang are banned in the United States in part because of allegations that Uyghurs detained under the mass internment campaign were forced to work in textile factories upon release.
What is the XPCC?
The XPCC, which is referred to as Bingtuan in China, dates to the early days of the People’s Republic of China. It was founded in 1954 with decommissioned troops from the People’s Liberation Army and initially focused on security in a relatively sparsely populated border area and on agriculture and construction projects.
In the decades since, the XPCC's footprint has grown considerably. It now has stakes in industries including media, mining, logistics, clothing, insurance, tourism and others. In 2023, the XPCC's output in goods and services were valued in excess of $50 billion, more than 20% of Xinjiang's total GDP.
XPCC is among the world’s largest producers of cotton, the importation of which has been banned in the United States. News reports have said entities tied to the corps account for about 30% of China’s cotton production.
The U.S. and human rights groups have said the production is in part driven by forced labor. China denies the accusations and has said the work of the corps has led to a more prosperous region. News reports have noted a few relative benefits of working for the XPCC. This account in Foreign Policy magazine published on the occasion of XPCC's 60th birthday noted that laborers for the corps are paid more than other workers.
What is unique about the XPCC?
While the XPCC has grown into a major conglomerate, it is structured in a way similar to a military unit in that it is divided into 14 divisions that are subdivided into dozens of regiments.
Its leaders take military titles who exercise administrative control over areas in which they operate. That includes authority over its court and educational systems in Bingtuan territories.
Nearly 3.5 million people in Xinjiang live under XPCC's direct authority, making it a parallel government to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or XUAR. In 2021, the corps managed more than one-sixth of the region and a quarter of its arable land.
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Why has the U.S. sanctioned the XPCC?
In July 2020, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned XPCC for its involvement in a mass internment campaign against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in response to a supposed threat of terrorism.
The U.S. has labeled Chinese persecution of Uyghurs a genocide because it seeks to diminish native culture and traditions in the name of assimilation. More than 1 million people are thought to have been held in reeducation camps designed to promote assimilation with the dominant Chinese Han culture, which critics allege the XPCC has helped to promote in Xinjiang by facilitating migration.
Chen Quanguo, who as Communist Party secretary of the XUAR implemented that campaign, was also the first political commissar of the XPCC, which gave him authority over the growing conglomerate.
“The XPCC has been used to detain Uyghurs in camps and prisons, to surveil Uyghurs … they have contributed massive police forces,” German researcher Adrian Zenz, who has documented the persecution of Muslims in Xinjiang, told RFA Uyghur. “And the XPCC is used to a large extent for forced labor as Uyghurs are being transferred to XPCC factories.”
The Sheffield Hallam study reported that 70% of the land in one village was transferred from Uyghur farmers.
The celebrants who gathered for the 70th anniversary offered another take. Ma Xingrui, party secretary for the XUAR, credited the XPCC for playing a central role in ensuring a harmonious Xinjiang.
“We must adhere to the idea of one chessboard and one family between the corps and the locals from beginning to end,” he said.
Alim Seytoff from RFA Uyghur contributed reporting. Edited by Jim Snyder and Boer Deng.