Mahmoud Mutawa – Lima:
What is the ideal reward for an extremist who commits murder and genocide against an entire race? Maybe the movie “Mulan” will answer” The new Chinese film, produced by the American Walt Disney Company, revolves around a warrior girl in ancient China. Its production cost amounted to $200 million, and it began showing on Disney’s digital broadcasting platform in many countries of the world..
At the end of the film, the American company thanks a number of Chinese institutions that helped it with the film. It includes four propaganda institutions affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party in the Muslim-majority region of Xinjiang in northwestern China. In addition to the Public Security Office in the city of Turpan, which was the first city to document the detention camps established by China to change the identity of Muslims.
Widespread criticism
The new film sparked controversy because parts of it were filmed in the Xinjiang region, where human rights groups and some governments, including the United States, document violations as part of China’s campaign against Uighurs and other Muslims..
The New York Times described the matter as “funny and sad at the same time,” while American lawmakers called on the Walt Disney Company to explain its relationship with the “security and propaganda” authorities in the Chinese region of Xinjiang, during the production of the movie “Mulan,” which they said gives implicit legitimacy to the perpetrators of crimes that may amount to genocide..
Republican members of both houses of Congress wrote a letter to Disney CEO Bob Chapek, in which they said that “Disney’s apparent cooperation with PRC officials who bear the greatest responsibility for committing or covering up atrocities is deeply troubling,” and the letter urged Disney to provide a detailed explanation..
The letter was reposted on Twitter by the Congressional Executive Committee on China, a panel that monitors human rights and the rule of law in China and provides an annual report to President Donald Trump and Congress. The lawmakers said information about Beijing’s role in detaining Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang was widespread in all media before the filming of Mulan..
The Uighurs are not alone
The new film did not violate the rights of the Uyghurs alone, but also violated the rights of many residents of the areas where filming took place, including the Mongolian tribes who refuse to have the Chinese language imposed on their residents..
It seems shocking that the girl whose story the film tells, which revolves around the girl Mulan, who joins the imperial army to defend the region “northwest China” from the “Roran” invaders, as the original popular story talks about a girl belonging to tribes that came from Mongolia, and she does not speak Chinese..
The screening of the film comes at a time when the residents of Inner Mongolia are protesting against the imposition of the Chinese language on them and the erasure of their culture and language, which the film reinforced by emphasizing the control of the Communist Party over all parts of China, and demonstrated the desperation of its residents to protect the ruling regime with full development..
In general, the film’s team is known to be affiliated with the communist regime in China, and what was explicitly observed in this regard was in 2017, when the film’s director, Niki Caro, published a picture of possible areas for filming and placed a comment on it, “Urmuqi/Asia” in reference to the capital of Xinjiang, and a comment was then mentioned under the picture: “Shame on you, boycott Mulan and talk about the Uyghurs and their extermination in the same region.”“.
