Netflix defends decision to adapt Liu Cixin’s novel, says doesn't agree to author's Uighurs comments

Netflix on Friday said it will maintain its decision to adapt Chinese author Liu Cixin’s book The Three-Body Problem as it judges the individual projects on their merit. The streaming platform was responding to the letter of five Republican US senators who have urged Netflix Inc to reconsider its plan to adapt the book into a television series. According to a report by Bloomberg, Netflix said that Liu is the author of the book but is not the creator of the show. “We do not agree with his comments, which are entirely unrelated to his book or this Netflix show,” the OTT platform said. Reuters reported that the author has defended the Chinese government’s clampdown on ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims residing in the Xinjiang region. In a letter to Netflix, the senators, led by Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, said the decision of the streaming platform to adapt Liu’s work amounted to the normalisation of the Chinese government’s crimes.  They asked Netflix to seriously reconsider the implications of providing a platform to Liu. Earlier this month, Netflix said that co-creators of Game of Thrones David Benioff and DB Weiss will be adapting The Three-Body Problem and its sequels, along with TV writer Alexander Woo. A report by The Guardian quoted Benioff and Weiss saying that the books were the most ambitious science-fiction series that they have read. Woo called the books an elegant and deeply human allegory. Liu is a consulting producer for the series. Liu in 2019 told the New Yorker magazine, “If anything, the government is helping their economy and trying to lift them out of poverty. If you were to loosen up the country a bit, the consequences would be terrifying.” Walt Disney Co was also recently criticized by US lawmakers for filming parts of Mulan in Xinjiang. Netflix streaming services can be accessed in more than 190 countries in the world, however, it does bit operate in China.