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Full text: Human Rights Record of the United States in 2016
March 09,2017   By:Xinhua
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BEIJING, March 9, 2017 -- The State Council Information Office of the People's Republic of China published a report titled "Human Rights Record of the United States in 2016" on Thursday.
 
Following is the full text of the report:
 
Human Rights Record of the United States in 2016
 
State Council Information Office of the People's Republic of China
 
March 2017
 
Foreword
 
On March 3 local time, the State Department of the United States released its country reports on human rights practices, posing once again as "the judge of human rights". Wielding "the baton of human rights," it pointed fingers and cast blame on the human rights situation in many countries while paying no attention to its own terrible human rights problems. People cannot help asking about the actual human rights situation of the United States in 2016. Concrete facts show that the United States saw continued deterioration in some key aspects of its existent human rights issues last year. With the gunshots lingering in people's ears behind the Statue of Liberty, worsening racial discrimination and the election farce dominated by money politics, the self-proclaimed human rights defender has exposed its human rights "myth" with its own deeds.
 
-- The frequent occurrence of gun-related crimes led to heavy casualties and the incarceration rate remained high. There were a total of 58,125 gun violence incidents, including 385 mass shootings, in the United States in 2016, leaving 15,039 killed and 30,589 injured (www.gunviolencearchive.org, December 31, 2016). The United States had the second highest prisoner rate, with 693 prisoners per 100,000 of the national population (www.statista.com, April 2016). There had been 70 million Americans incarcerated - that's almost one in three adults - with some form of criminal record (harvardlawreview.org, January 5, 2017).
 
-- Livelihood of middle- and low-income groups was worrisome amid widening income gap. In 2016, the proportion of adult Americans who had a full-time job hit a record low since 1983. Over the last three decades, nearly 70 percent of income ended up in the pockets of the wealthiest 10 percent. The population of U.S. middle-class registered a turning point toward contraction. Besides, one out of seven Americans remained in poverty, with life of 45 million people in strained circumstances. The average life expectancy fell from 78.9 years to 78.8 years as the United States posted a drop in overall life expectancy for the first time in over 20 years.
 
-- Racism continued to exist and racial relations worsened. In 2016, the United Nations' Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent reported to the United Nations Human Rights Council that racial problems were severe in the United States. The colonial history, enslavement, racial subordination and segregation, racial terrorism and racial inequality in the United States remained a serious challenge. Police killings were reminiscent of the past racial terror of lynching. The United States was undergoing a "human rights crisis" (www.un.org, August 18, 2016).
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