U.N. rights chief urges China to review counter-terrorism policies

STORY: Bachelet started her China trip, the first by a U.N. Human Rights High Commissioner in 17 years, on Monday last week, in the southern city of Guangzhou before heading to Xinjiang.

She reiterated that her trip which included a visit to the western region of Xinjiang, was not an investigation into the country's human rights policies.

The 6-day day trip has been long in the making after Bachelet said in 2018 she wanted unfettered access to Xinjiang, where her office said last year it believed mostly Muslim ethnic Uyghur people had been unlawfully detained, mistreated and forced to work, there was no mention of it in either side's public remarks.

China initially denied the existence of any detention camps in Xinjiang but in 2018 said it had set up "vocational training centers" necessary to curb what it said was terrorism, separatism and religious radicalism in the region.

Bachelet said she raised with the Chinese government the lack of independent judicial oversight on the operation of the centers and allegations of the use of force, ill-treatment and severe restrictions on religious practice.