China has officially approved a new law to promote “ethnic unity” with the country’s ethnic minorities, a push that critics say would escalate the communist regime’s repressive campaign against such groups.
The National People’s Congress, China’s rubber-stamp legislature, adopted the legislation called “Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress” during a meeting on March 12, according to state media Xinhua. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has signed an order to enforce the law, which will take effect on July 1, Xinhua said.
The legislation, which Beijing began drafting in November 2023, has sparked fresh concern that ethnic minorities’ access to their own language and culture would be further curtailed, as it explicitly mandates Mandarin as the primary language across school education, official documents, and state-run businesses nationwide….
China Adopts ‘Unity’ Law to Push Mandarin as Main Language in Minority Regions
