Diplomacy could be difficult with a state officially designated as genocidal.
Now it’s an issue for Biden. Photographer: NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP
In the final weeks and months of Donald Trump’s presidency, the State Department took some steps that are likely to be reversed. President Joe Biden’s administration is now reviewing these last-minute actions, such as designating the Houthi movement in Yemen a terrorist organization and imposing new sanctions on Iranian leaders and organizations, with a red marker in hand.
One 11th-hour policy change, however, may be here to stay: the designation of China’s repression of Muslim Uighurs in Xinjiang province as genocide. At his confirmation hearing last week, and in his first press briefing this week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken agreed that what China’s government has done to the Uighurs was genocide.
