When I was there, living
in China, in August 2016,
they asked all of the population
to attend a free body check test.
And they asked us to
our blood be tested, our face scanned
and our voice to be recorded.
I asked the local officials,
"Can I see thee results of those tests?"
They told me,
"You don't have any right
to ask about the result.
If you want to know,
you can ask the police."
It means that it's not about the benefit
or good of the people.
It's being used for some untold purpose
of the Chinese government.
My name is Tahir Imin.
I am a member of Uyghur Ethnic Nation
in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
- Xinjiang is in far western China
where there is a Turkic
minority living there
among other minorities in
China known as the Uyghurs.
It's a very different part of China.
It doesn't really look like
Beijing or Shanghai at all.
It's much closer,
topographically and culturally,
to Afghanistan and Pakistan.
- Uyghurs are predominantly Muslim.
They speak a different language.
Everything is different
from Han Chinese people.
In 2016, the Chinese communist government
created a big police state in the region.
Living in that region itself
feels very much like an open-air prison.
When you get up in the morning,
and you commute to work,
you'll be stopped at a check point
and have your cellphone messages searched.
When you apply for a passport,
you might be asked for a
strand of hair or an eyelash
for a DNA database
or asked to take a 360-degree portrait
for facial recognition cameras.
Those DNA collection and
the face recognition system
and other surveillance technology
became only one part of their oppressive
and ethnic cleansing
strategy on the region.
They created a large amount of camps
to arrest and detain the people.
According to the UN,
as much as a million Uyghurs
are now in these detention centers
that the Chinese call
political reeducation centers
or even vocational training centers
as if they've moved these
Uyghurs into these centers
to provide them professional
help and work training.
They are sent to those camps
to renounce their religious
and their national ethnic identity.
Last May, the Chinese police
officials contacted me.
They asked me to cooperate
with the Chinese government
Or at least I should stop my writing
about the Chinese oppression.
After I rejected, the
police officer told me,
"We will educate your daughter
as a communist loyalist against you
and other Uyghur people.
Your daughter would be
number one enemy of you."
We've seen journalists writing about it.
We've seen organizations
like Human Rights Watch.
Independent researchers
out of Australia, Germany,
the United States.
We've seen organizations under the UN.
All of these organizations
have confirmed that this is
something that is happening.
Upwards of a million people are being held
in internment camps.
And where's the global outcry?
There's really no consequence, so far,
for the Chinese government
for perpetrating this
on its own people.
Chinese government believe that
international community are very weak
to cope with Chinese
oppression and genocide,
because China believes its
military and economic power.
The Chinese government
has put a lot of money
behind winning over Central
Asia and the Middle East.
They have, you know,
incorporated a number of these countries
into their Belt and Road Campaign,
basically their international
development campaign.
And it's really hard for these countries
to walk away from that
sort of source of income
and economic partnership.
A lot of these projects are funded
because the Chinese bank
is offering the loan.
So you have this situation
where all the money
eventually goes back to China,
and all the leverage is with China.
Some countries are starting to realize
that this is not the best deal.
There are real benefits,
but they also have to weigh it against
the political influence
China might be able to have
in terms of leverage.
This is about a very powerful government
that has a stated ambition
to essentially reprogram and wipe out
a practice of a religion and
a culture within its borders.
States certainly won't
stand up against China
on things such as what's
happening in Xinjiang.
People have to put pressure
on their politicians,
whether it's Americans in the
United States or any country.
People have to care and
say this is not okay.
There's only one thing we can do.
Be patient, be united around
good things, good people,
and to never lose the
hope about the future.
