WASHINGTON—The Trump administration concluded that China has committed “genocide and crimes against humanity” against the Uighur ethnic group, delivering a forceful condemnation to Beijing over a mass repression campaign that has yet to prompt tough international action.
The determination, which was announced in a statement Tuesday by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, accuses China of imprisoning, torturing and carrying out forced sterilization against the Uighurs, a Muslim minority group.
“I believe this genocide is ongoing, and that we are witnessing the systematic attempt to destroy Uighurs by the Chinese party-state,” Mr. Pompeo said. He said that Communist Party authorities “are engaged in the forced assimilation and eventual erasure of a vulnerable ethnic and religious minority group.”
The genocide designation, which also applies to other minority groups in Xinjiang, doesn’t carry any automatic legal consequences, but it puts…