OTHER KE Y DEVELOPMENTS Jews faced physical attacks and threats of violence at places of The CCP government exercises its broad economic and geopoworship and in public throughout the year. In Germany, a man with a litical influence to pressure foreign countries near and far to accept its shovel badly injured a Jewish student leaving a synagogue in Hamburg demands without concern for human rights. Tactics include harassment, on Sukkot. Likewise, a man wielding an ax entered a synagogue comintimidation, and detainment of human rights activists, ethnic and relipound in Ukraine, though security guards stopped him before he gious minorities, and other critics and dissidents. For instance, in 2020, entered the building. Assailants attacked Jewish families in Argentina reports revealed that Turkey—a country with linguistic and cultural and France as well as a Brazilian man wearing a kippah. ties to the Uyghurs and home to thousands of Uyghur refugees—has Jews were also vic tims of xenophobic discrimination. increasingly yielded to China’s pressure, reportedly silenced Uyghur Antisemitism featured heavily in Poland’s presidential campaign. critics in Turkey, and even repatriated Uyghur refugees to China where There were multiple instances reported of Jews being refused serthey face atrocities that the U.S. government has deemed genocide and vice due to their faith, Jewish professionals enduring antisemitic crimes against humanity. Furthermore, there are growing concerns that stereotypes in their places of work, and even a police request for Turkey might enter into an extradition agreement with China that could a list of all Jews living in a Ukrainian city. Jewish cemeteries were result in more forcible repatriations of Uyghur refugees. Many Uyghur frequent targets for acts of vandalism, including spray-painted Nazi refugees in countries such as Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, and rhetoric and imagery, smashed headstones, and stolen property. Thailand remained in similarly precarious situations in 2020. In addition, A spate of such attacks occurred in Greece in the fall and winter, in February 2020, then Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo revealed and cemeteries in at least eight other countries around the world that China had pressured several countries to not join the newly estabsuffered similar circumstances. lished International Religious Freedom Alliance. Textbooks in countries whose governments profess Islam as an The CCP government also exerted pressure on international official religion continued to contain antisemitic content. Iran’s textcompanies, including U.S. companies, to disregard human rights books portrayed Jews as “conspirational” and referenced “Jewish abuses in, and international scrutiny over, their business operations in gold hoarders and capitalists.” Saudi Arabia’s textbooks, while China. Following growing concerns over U.S. companies’ complicity significantly improved from previous years, still discussed Jewish both in facilitating China’s digital authoritarianism targeting ethnic “treachery” and referred to Christians and Jews alike as “infidels.” and religious minorities in China and Uyghur forced labor in their There were promising signs in 2020 as well. France, a country Chinese supply chains, the U.S. government enacted and enforced normally associated with ever-increasing numbers of yearly antisemitic domestic laws and regulations to curb human rights abuses involvincidents, recorded a 50 percent drop in such cases though France also ing U.S. companies. In retaliation, the Chinese government issued had some of the most enduring lockdown policies in Europe to mancountermeasures in January 2021, effectively forcing U.S. companies age the Covid-19 pandemic. At least three countries announced the to choose between complying with U.S. laws and Chinese laws. creation of positions similar to the U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and The CCP has intensified its covert influence and infiltration activCombat Anti-Semitism, as well as the UN and the Council of Europe. ities overseas through the United Front Work Department (UFWD), Albania, Argentina, Italy, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, and Uruguay and with top CCP leaders issuing directives. Termed a “magic weapon” organizations like the Global Imams Council adopted the International of the CCP, the UFWD has undergone significant reorganization Holocaust Remembrance under CCP General Secretary Xi Alliance’s “Working Definition Jinping with a renewed focus on of Antisemitism.” Crucially, overseas Chinese populations, The CCP government also exerted pressure numerous countries and multiethnic minority affairs, and relilateral organizations announced gious groups. For example, U.S. on international companies, including Holocaust and antisemitism authorities arrested a Tibetan U.S. companies, to disregard human rights awareness education programs, New York Police Department abuses in, and international scrutiny over, millions of dollars in security officer in September 2020 for funding, and comprehensive spying on the local Tibetan diastheir business operations in China. strategies for combating antisempora community. The officer’s itism. USCIRF held two events on family members reportedly work antisemitism in 2020: a hearing for the CCP, the government, and entitled “Global Efforts to Combat Antisemitism” and a virtual event the military, while one of his handlers was identified as a Chinese focused on antisemitism in Europe amid the COVID-19 pandemic. consulate official with direct ties to the UFWD. Similar incidents of surveillance and intimidation targeting Tibetans in the diaspora also took place in Sweden, Switzerland, and Canada. China’s International Influence on Religious In August 2020, the State Depar tment designated the Freedom and Human Rights Confucius Institute U.S. Center (CIUS)—the de facto headquarters While the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) policies and actions for all Confucius Institutes operating in the United States, which have have resulted in severe persecution of religious groups within China’s close ties to the UFWD—as a foreign mission, following widespread borders, its growing overseas influence and activities also negaconcerns over censorship and threats to academic freedom that tively affected religious freedom and other human rights far beyond. have implications for religious freedom. For example, the Confucius According to Freedom House, China’s transnational repression camInstitutes’ influence operations in the United States and in other paign is by far the “most sophisticated, global, and comprehensive”; countries have in the past resulted in universities rescinding speaking Human Rights Watch similarly declared that China “remained the invitations to the Dalai Lama. In 2020, many U.S. universities severed biggest threat to global human rights” in 2020. their ties with the Confucius Institutes. USCIRF | ANNUAL REPORT 2021 89