SHANGHAI: China’s foreign ministry denied claims from an Australian think-tank that it had destroyed thousands of mosques in its western Xinjiang region, and said there are over 24,000 mosques there, “more mosques per capita than many Muslim countries.”
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) had released a report on Thursday which estimated that about 16,000 mosques in Xinjiang have been destroyed or damaged as a result of government policies, mostly since 2017.
The estimates were made using satellite imagery and based on a sample of 900 religious sites prior to 2017, including mosques, shrines and sacred sites.
“The Chinese government has embarked on a systematic and intentional campaign to rewrite the cultural heritage of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region… in order to render those indigenous…