Ex-Xinjiang party chief under probe over violations

The disciplinary body for China’s Communist Party said Friday it has placed the former Xinjiang party chief under investigation over suspected violations of discipline and law. Ma Xingrui is a member of the party’s Central Committee and served as party secretary of the Xinjiang region in China’s northwest. He also previously served as director of the National Ethnic Affairs Commission and deputy party chief in Guangdong province.

It was unclear what violations Ma allegedly committed. Ma is the latest senior official to be removed from power this year. China’s Xi Jinping removed the top general in charge of the country’s military in January. Ma was replaced by Chen Xiaojiang last July as party chief of Xinjiang, a region that had become well-known internationally for a years-long campaign of extrajudicial detentions.

China had detained a million or more minorities, including ethnic Uyghur Muslims, saying it was in response to a series of attacks by a small number of Uyghur extremists. By 2021, when Ma had become secretary, China said it had shut most of the detention centers. But at least a few camp sites had been converted into prison-like centers, and information leaked to the AP showed that thousands of Uyghurs were thrown into prison.

In March, China passed a law that experts say cements its assimilationist approach towards its ethnic minority groups, building on years of policy changes at the provincial level in Xinjiang and elsewhere.