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Human rights failures remain a major concern. Abatement of pollution and improvements in systems to ensure food, drug, and product safety are major concerns, especially after notorious episodes of exporting poisoned pet food, toothpaste and infant formula.
Human rights failures remain a major concern. Abatement of pollution and improvements in systems to ensure food, drug, and product safety are major concerns, especially after notorious episodes of exporting poisoned pet food, toothpaste and infant formula.
===Repression in 2008===
In 2008 China's human rights record remained poor and worsened in some areas. During the year the government increased its severe cultural and religious repression of ethnic minorities in Tibetan areas and the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR), increased detention and harassment of dissidents and petitioners, and maintained tight controls on freedom of speech and the Internet. Abuses peaked around high-profile events, such as the Olympics and the unrest in Tibet. As in previous years, citizens did not have the right to change their government. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), both local and international, continued to face intense scrutiny and restrictions. Other serious human rights abuses included extrajudicial killings, torture and coerced confessions of prisoners, and the use of forced labor, including prison labor. Workers cannot choose an independent union to represent them in the workplace, and the law does not protect workers' right to strike. The government continued to monitor, harass, detain, arrest, and imprison journalists, writers, activists, and defense lawyers and their families, many of whom were seeking to exercise their rights under the law.<ref> See [http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/eap/119037.htm U.S. State Department, ''2008 Human Rights Report: China (includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau)'' Feb. 25, 2009] </ref>
==Further reading==
==Further reading==