China is among the most ethnically homogeneous large countries in the world, with Han Chinese accounting for 91 percent of its population.

The ruling Communist Party considers China’s homogeneity and social cohesion to be pillars of its strength (and, also, potent rationalizations for discrimination against ethnic minorities and authoritarian rule), NY Mag reported.

But the territory of Xinjiang, in northwest China, is home to a large population of Uighurs, a predominantly Muslim, Turkic ethnic group.

The Chinese government has long worried that the Uighurs will attempt to establish an independent homeland in the region, which they commonly call East Turkestan.

In 2009, ethnic riots in Xinjiang claimed hundreds of lives; since then, individual Uighur nationalists have carried out multiple terrorist attacks.

So, to combat the impression that Uighurs have any cause for wanting their own separate state — let alone for deploying violence to achieve it — Xi Jinping’s government has decided to declare Islam a contagious “ideological illness,” and quarantine 1 million Uighurs in reeducation camps, according to an estimate from the United Nations.

In interviews, former inmates from these camps say that they were made to renounce their faith, sing Communist Party songs, consume pork, and drink alcohol; other reports suggest some of the truly “ideologically sick” have been tortured and killed.

At first, Beijing was content to reserve its concentration camps for suspected radicals.

But, as the Atlantic’s Sigal Samuel explains, they eventually decided that the Uighurs’ ideological malady was so destructive and contagious, it was best to quarantine them prophylactically, upon the slightest apparent symptom (like, say, the appearance of a long beard on an Uighur male’s face).

Human rights organizations, UN officials, and many foreign governments are urging China to stop the crackdown.

But Chinese officials maintain that what they call vocational training centers do not infringe on Uighurs’ human rights.

They have refused to share information about the detention centers, however, and prevent journalists and foreign investigators from examining them, CFR reported.

Accurate numbers, and stories from those detained, have been particularly hard to come by.

Local authorities not only punished anyone who was in contact with media but have also threatened and detained relatives of overseas Uighurs who have spoken out.

Yet this tactic seemed to lose its power last month when hundreds of Uighurs around the world began posting photos and stories of their missing loved ones online under #MeTooUyghur in an attempt to pressure China to share updates about their relatives’ location and wellbeing.

And while Zenz told Newsweek he has not really heard of U.S. residents being caught up in Xinjiang, it could be that party leaders have become more emboldened than ever.

“The re-education campaign meets deeper government needs of total ideological control over this restive region. For this end, the state is willing to meet with significant international pushback and criticism over its actions. Also, China increasingly sees itself as a powerful nation that can do whatever it wants to within its own boundaries (and, in some ways, beyond),” Zenz said.

Experts estimate that Xinjiang reeducation efforts started in 2014 and were drastically expanded in 2017.

Reuters journalists, observing satellite imagery, found that thirty-nine of the camps almost tripled in size between April 2017 and August 2018; they cover a total area roughly the size of 140 soccer fields.

Similarly, analyzing local and national budgets over the past few years, Germany-based Xinjiang expert Adrian Zenz found that construction spending on security-related facilities in Xinjiang increased by 20 billion yuan (around $2.96 billion) in 2017.