CECC China Commission Seeks Controls on DNA Tech

Congressional-Executive Commission on China Chair Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and co-chair Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Ore) are calling on the Administration to impose export controls on technology used by China to collect biometric data in Tibet.

The lawmakers made the request in letters to the Secretaries of Commerce, State and Treasury. The technology is used by People’s Republic of China Public Security Bureaus and other entities in Tibet to collect biometric data which is used by PRC police for political identification and racial profiling.

They also asked for Global Magnitsky sanctions on PRC officials responsible for the forced separation of Tibetan children from their families, a program that the lawmakers said results in serious human rights violations and cultural and linguistic erasure.

The request follows a prior letter by CECC Commissioners to the CEO of Thermo Fisher Scientific that expressed concerns that Thermo Fisher products were used for mass biometric data collection and surveillance that “could enable further gross violations” of the human rights of Tibetans.

“We write to you concerning mass DNA collection by police in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and other egregious human rights abuses facing the people of Tibet. We ask that you work together to take additional actions to address these abuses and stop commercial activities by companies participating in the deployment and management of biometric ID surveillance – in particular, technology used in Tibet and the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) for political identification and racial profiling,” the lawmakers wrote.

The lawmakers are requesting that the Tibet Autonomous Region Public Security Bureaus and any other entities affiliated with the mass DNA collection project be added to the Commerce Department Bureau of Industry and Security’s Entity List.

“This will ensure that U.S. companies are not contributing to, and are not directly or indirectly complicit in, the collecting and building of biometric ID surveillance capabilities in the TAR or other Tibetan areas,” they wrote.