China Denounces Trump Meeting With Religious Exiles as Meddling

  • Trump hosts Uighur, Falun Gong representatives at White House
  • Beijing has stepped up effort to defend crackdown on Muslims
Kashgar, in China’s Xinjiang region.Photographer: Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images
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China criticized a meeting between President Donald Trump and Chinese religious exiles as an unacceptable interference in its affairs, as Beijing faced new criticism over its mass detention of ethnic Muslim minorities.

China’s foreign ministry made the remarks Thursday after Trump hosted 27 representatives of what the White House said were persecuted religious groups in the Oval Office, including four Chinese. Among the invitees was Jewher Ilham, whose father, Uighur economist Ilham Tohti, is serving a life sentenceBloomberg Terminal in China on separatism charges.