MR. CORY ANDREWS: Hello.
I'm Cory Andrews from the Bureau
of Democracy, Human Rights,
and Labor at the U.S.
Department of State
here in Washington, DC.
Thank you for joining
us for this discussion
where we will address the
Chinese government's campaign
of repression against Uighurs,
ethnic Kazakhs, Kyrgyz,
and other Muslim minorities in
the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous
region of China.
These human rights abuses
have been well documented,
but unfortunately, in
many parts of the world,
there is still a lack of
awareness around the extent
and intensity of the repression
suffered by these groups
at the hands of the
Chinese government.
Today, we have with
us a panel of experts
with deep knowledge
of what is happening
on the ground in Xinjiang.
We'll discuss many of
the repressive policies
of the Chinese government,
including the mass detention
of Muslim minorities in
sprawling internment camps,
the ramping up of high
tech surveillance,
the banning of religious
and cultural practices,
and the Chinese government's
widespread disinformation
campaign to cover up or
influence public perception
of their actions.
We'll start off by investigating
each of these issues
and getting the latest
updates from our panel.
Then we'll turn to you for
your questions and thoughts.
If you have a question
for the panel,
please submit it in
the comments section
next to the video player, or
on Twitter using the hashtag,
#Xinjiang.
Let me introduce our panel.
To my left is Dr.
Sophie Richardson.
She is the China director
at Human Rights Watch
and the author of
numerous articles
on domestic Chinese
political reform.
She has testified before
the European Parliament
and the U.S. Senate and
House of Representatives.
Dr. Richardson has
provided commentary
to the BBC, CNN, The New York
Times, and many other media
organizations.
Next to Sophie is
Nury Turkel, a U.S.
based Uighur rights advocate
and attorney here in Washington.
Nury was born in a re-education
camp in Xinjiang region
at the height of the
Cultural Revolution in China.
He is chairman of the board of
the Uighur Human Rights Project
and one of its
co-founders, as well as
a past president of the
Uighur American Association.
Nury has been speaking publicly
on nearly a non-stop basis
over the past two
years, advocating
for a global response to the
crisis of the Uighur people,
appearing most recently as
one of the opening speakers
at the Oslo Freedom
Forum in May.
Also joining us is Alim Seytoff,
the director for the Uighur
Service at Radio Free Asia.
He previously served as
the executive director
for the Uighur Human
Rights Project.
In 1999, he started at RFA
as a production coordinator
and broadcaster.
Throughout his career, Alim
has written many articles
on China's human rights
violations of the Uighur people
and is frequently interviewed
about these issues
by leading media outlets.
Thank you all for being a part
of this important discussion.
MR. NURY TURKEL: Thank you.
DR. SOPHIE RICHARDSON: Thanks.
MR. ANDREWS: Sophie, you
and your organization,
Human Rights Watch,
have engaged directly
on the Chinese government's
actions in Xinjiang.
What can you tell us about
your organization's work
in the issues, on the issue,
and what you've learned.
DR. RICHARDSON: Yeah.
We've been writing about
human rights violations
against Uighurs for 25 years.
And a lot of that has
been about restrictions
on religious freedom,
restrictions on movements,
torture, enforced disappearances
in the wake of the 2009
protests, but most
recently, we've
been quite focused
on the establishment
of these political
re-education camps,
for which there is
literally no legal basis.
People are being
detained because they
are Uighur, as in
other Turkic Muslims,
and subjected essentially
to extensive political
re-education to
prove that they're
loyal to the Chinese government.
We've also spent a
huge amount of time
in the last few years
writing about the abuses
of surveillance technology
in that region in particular
to track people's movements,
but to literally gather
and criminalize information
about people's behavior that's
legal, but is now considered
suspicious by authorities.
We've also written about some
of the Chinese companies that
are involved in designing
sort of the architecture
and the algorithms
of repression.
MR. ANDREWS: Wow.
Thank you for your
important work.
Nury, you've spent years
working on these issues.
But recently, there has
been a clear increase
in the repressive actions
of the Chinese authorities.
Can you share your
insights on what
is happening right
now in Xinjiang?
MR. TURKEL: Thank you
very much for organizing
this important panel discussion.
In the last several
days, several years,
particularly since July 5,
2009, the Chinese government
were trying to find a way to
solve the Uighur problem once
and for all.
And they realized that Uighurs'
ethno-national identity,
religious practices
would be eventually
a political threat to
the Chinese state because
of the insecurity that the
Chinese officials sensed
and CCP's concern that the
Uighur ethno-national identity,
if allowed to be
continued, eventually
pose a political threat
against the Chinese state.
So they ratcheted up the
pressure since April 2017,
to be exact, with a draconian
legislation, a regulation
called a
de-extremification measure,
enacted by the local
government interim chair.
That paved the way
for today's atrocities
that we have been learned about
in the last couple of years.
So as a result, the
Chinese government
have rounded up up to 3
million based on the U.S.
government's estimate.
2 to 3 million has been a
figure that the U.S. government
has been stating in public.
So in addition to
rounding up, detaining
such a mass percentage of the
Uighur population and others,
they also created an open
prison-like environment
for the Uighurs who are
outside of the camps.
And also in addition to the
domestic pressure and mass
detention, the China's
oppression also
reached to the shores
of the countries
like the United
States and elsewhere.
So they have been engaging in
both domestic and international
front to silence international
community, the Uighur
community, while they are
engaging in modern day
internment camps and then
implementing after testing it
for the last couple
of years what's
called a digital
authoritarian police state.
MR. ANDREWS: Thank you.
Alim, through your work
at Radio Free Asia,
you focused the spotlight on
Chinese government's campaign
of repression in Xinjiang.
What can you share with
us from your perspective,
and why is it important
to raise awareness
about these human rights abuses?
MR. ALIM SEYTOFF: Yeah, the
Uighur service at Radio Free
Asia is probably the only
one independent Uighur
media in the world.
We are specifically focused
on reporting on the Xinjiang
Uighur autonomous region.
And since past three years,
especially after Chen Quanguo
became the Party Secretary of
the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous
Region in August
2016, then we had
seen, through our reports,
massive policy change.
In the early 2017,
we began to report
the disappearance of large
numbers of Uighur people.
For example, in
Kashgar Prefecture
alone, we were able to confirm
that 120,000 Uighurs were--
mostly males, working age
males-- were detained.
And in places like Hotan,
Karakax County, and others,
we were able to confirm that up
to 40% of the local population
were detained.
At the time, it was
unclear under what kind
of laws or what kind of
places they were detained.
Then soon we were
able to interview
the officials and the people
who are teaching in these camps.
Then it was a large scale
detention of this people.
Then we began to realize
through our reports
that a number of
many police stations
were set up as checkpoints to
specifically target the Uighur
Muslim population.
And so we have reported
on the massive scale
of these detentions
of the Uighurs.
Then later, we
realized these people
were detained in these
internment camps, what
the Chinese government later
called as vocational skills
training centers.
But in fact, through
our interviews
with Chinese officials, Uighur
officials, local leaders,
and former detainees,
that these were
no ordinary vocational
skills training centers.
In fact, these were
internment camps,
and those Uighurs were
detained arbitrarily.
They did not have
any legal recourse.
And they were
detained indefinitely.
Not a single Uighur
in the camp knew
they were going to
ever be released.
And the physical mental
torture were involved,
and it wasn't something
like described
by the Chinese government.
So I think through
our reporting,
then later, through
the reporting
of other international
media, the world
began to gradually
grasp what was happening
and understand the nature of
Chinese policies in the region,
and nature of internment camps,
and even the nature of what
Nury just described,
the high tech police
state the Chinese
government established.
MR. ANDREWS: Thank you.
Let's now talk about the
rapid and expansive growth
of these internment camps
we've been discussing
and what is happening
inside of them.
Nury, can you update us on this?
MR. TURKEL: Yes.
The re-education
camps, what we used
to know as the daily
re-education camps,
were in existence
before the construction
of these massive
internment camps
that the Chinese government
built since late 2016.
Based on various
reports, the camps
are still in the process of
being upgraded and expanded
as we speak.
Late last year, two credible
reports were published,
one by an Australian think
tank and the Reuters,
it states that the expansion
rate of these camps in less
than 20 month period was 465%.
The area of expansion is
equivalent of 140 soccer
fields.
And just in the outside
of the regional capital,
Urumqi, based on BBC, is
in the process of building
world's largest prison camp.
So there's no end in sight
as we speak on these camps.
There are also the
Chinese government
have turned this into a sort of
a political economy, a system,
that they invested a massive
amount of money in these camps.
And some of them
already have been
turned into forced labor camps.
So the world needs to
pay attention to this.
This is not just
something that's
happening to the Uighurs,
because China's government
is using these camps
as a laboratory
to test out how these
high tech methods works
to squelch political
resentment and keep
an eye on a potential
political upheaval.
So if it's not handled
properly urgently,
this will expand and become a
bigger problem for the world.
MR. ANDREWS: So in essence,
the Chinese government
has put a considerable
investment
in this over a very
short period of time.
MR. TURKEL: Absolutely.
MR. ANDREWS: Another issue that
has received a lot of attention
recently and is a key focus
of our discussion today
is the increasing use of
sophisticated high tech
surveillance as a tool
of control and repression
in Xinjiang.
From widespread installation
of security cameras
to phone monitoring apps,
compulsory DNA samples
and police checkpoints,
the Chinese government
is heightening its
police state control
and monitoring of the lives of
everyday people in Xinjiang.
Nury, what can you tell us
about the growing dystopian
reality in Xinjiang?
MR. TURKEL: Imagine
that you just
wanted to go about with
your daily routine.
You get up in the morning,
try to go to work,
try to go to school, or take
your children to daycare.
You have to pass through
security checkpoints.
You are forced to surrender
your phone for data scan.
You are allowing the
officials to do iris scans,
in some instance,
biometric data collection.
And while all this happening,
you see non-Uighur individuals
waving hands or not showing
any sympathy for you
to go through a different
method to allow yourself
to be subject to this kind of
surveillance, illegal search.
So that's kind of the daily
routine for the Uighurs.
And this is so invasive and
pervasive around the region.
Some policy experts liken
it to an open air prison.
Oftentimes, we focus
rightly so on the people
who have been
detained in the camps.
But the life of the Uighurs
who are outside of the camps
are probably even
worse to the extent
because it's happening
everyday to them.
In addition to this digital
surveillance that they set up,
they're also invading in
private homes of the Uighurs.
Even in some instances
in the reports written
by American scholars,
they're forcing the children
to spy on their parents
about their communication
or what they talk,
how they express their
or air their grievances.
What do they tell
their children?
So oftentimes we
have a difficulty
to even describe because I don't
think that anyone was prepared
this this level of brutality,
this level of high tech
or technology oriented
way of destroying
people's normal livelihood.
MR. ANDREWS: So it sounds like
a science fiction dystopian
novel, but it's reality.
Sophie, can you weigh in
on this surveillance state?
DR. RICHARDSON: Sure.
I mean, there are a couple
of important and sort of
contextual factors to consider.
One is that the
Chinese Communist Party
has had a longstanding impulse
to gather lots of information
about people.
What's different now is
the technological capacity
they have to both gather,
and process it, and use it.
And this is a country that has
no effective privacy rights.
So there's really no way
to combat or push back
against the idea that
certain kinds of information
are being gathered about you.
In May of this year,
we published a report
in which we described
having reverse
engineered an app that's
used by police in Xinjiang.
And we had seen
references in work
about other kinds of
technology, some of which
you've just mentioned,
to this app.
It's called the Integrated
Joint Operations Platform.
And essentially what
this system does,
it's sort of the
central nervous system
of surveillance in the region.
And it gathers different
streams of data
from things like CCTV
cameras from data doors,
from other kinds of publicly
available information.
But the app in particular
is used by police
to both check information
about an individual,
but it's also used to prompt
police to go and investigate
people.
And we wanted to
know what behavior
was of concern to police.
And in breaking
this thing apart,
we can see that even though
there are no laws about which
door of your house
you use or whether you
talk twice a day to your
neighbors or just once,
that this kind of behavior
was now actually being
tracked by the authorities.
And if the app decided that
your behavior was suspicious,
you were going to get a
visit from local authorities.
And in some cases, if they
didn't like your answers,
or the answers that they
plugged into the app
said that the person
should be detained,
that person could be detained.
So the authorities
in the region now
have the capacity to collect
massive amounts of data
about people.
And even if there is no legal
basis for detaining someone,
they're doing that.
MR. ANDREWS: Wow.
Thank you both.
Now let's take some
questions from the comments
section or those following along
on Twitter using the hashtag,
#Xinjiang.
Here's one question.
Why should the rest
of the world care
about what the Chinese
do to their own people
in their country?
Isn't it their right to govern
themselves as they want?
Alim, would you like
to try this one?
MR. SEYTOFF: Sure, I think
that's a very interesting
question.
That's a very good
question as well.
It is very much from the
Chinese government standpoint.
It is China's internal issue.
It's our business.
It's none of the rest
of the world's business.
But I think both Nury and Sophie
agree this is an interconnected
world, and nobody is an island.
And what happens in
your neighbor's house
does happen in your own house.
If there is a fire in
your neighbor's house,
if you're in an
apartment building,
if you do not put out
the fire in that house,
then the whole building
will be in flames.
So in this logic,
whatever happens in China,
it's not China's
internal business.
Because the way China
treats the Uighur people,
like what we major
media all reported,
this is not something
that has been seen.
As Secretary Pompeo
and others said,
these are the things that
happened in the 1930s
in Nazi Germany
and Soviet gulags.
So this is not something
the international community
can just turn a blind eye,
just keep their mouths shut.
This is something that
should wake up the world.
And this is 21st century,
and things like that
should not belong or
happen in the 21st century.
DR. RICHARDSON: I'll just
add that of course, we
believe that everybody
has political rights.
And if they actually got to
participate in these decisions,
that would be one thing.
But the Chinese
Communist Party has held
sole power for 70 years now.
It's not a democracy.
And so to suggest that the
policies that are currently
being pursued are
somehow the result
of an open democratic
participatory
political system is
simply not correct.
I mean, let's not conflate China
with the Chinese government
or the Chinese Communist Party.
And I think that in
a way, one of the--
if there's been any--
I wouldn't even call
it a silver lining,
but one of the slightly
reassuring aspects
of the growing global
concern about what's
happening to Uighurs is to
see lots of people inside
and outside China who are
Han or of other ethnicities
express a sense of
concern and solidarity
with Uighurs who are
suffering from some
of the same kinds of persecution
that those other communities
have.
But those are not the people
who are running the government.
MR. ANDREWS: Right.
MR. TURKEL: One quick
addition to Sophie
and Alim's point, I
think the vow never ever
again should mean something.
We were told after
the Second World War
that no one would be prosecuted
to the extent of being
subject to cultural
genocide after what we
have seen from the
Second World War
and what happened to the Jews.
So never again is happening
again in China today.
That's why, one of the
reasons that the world
should pay attention to this.
Number two, the
Chinese government
already been, quite comfortably,
through global times, even
through the ambassador
here in Washington DC,
that the Muslim problem
should be dealt with the way
that China is dealing
with the Uighurs.
The world should look
at this as a model.
This should give you
a chilling effect.
I mean, this should be
a chilling to people,
for reasonable people.
Do we really have to
follow Chinese model
to deal with Muslim problems,
so-called Muslim problems?
And then three,
China's government
is publicly stating
that they tried
to convert the Uighurs
to normal human being.
Under what standard?
What makes the Chinese
government official
to believe that their culture,
their language, their way
of life is superior to
that of the Uighurs,
so that the Uighurs and
the others should adopt it?
What kind of world do
we want for ourselves
and for the future generation?
The question is very simple.
What kind of world do we want to
leave for the next generation?
What kind of society
do we want to have?
What kind of privacy
rights do we want to enjoy?
These are the questions
that the people
in the liberal societies,
or civilized societies,
or anywhere around the
world should think about.
MR. ANDREWS: Right.
So governments and
private individuals
need to be asking
themselves these questions,
but what about the
private sector?
How can global
technology companies
use their economic power to
influence China on this issue?
Sophie, do you want
to take this one?
DR. RICHARDSON: Sure.
Everybody should
weigh in on this,
but I think it's not
even just a question
about their economic influence
as their own business
practices and their ethics.
We have been really
pushing a number
of companies,
international firms,
to explain what their due
diligence strategies are
to make sure that their business
practices are not enabling,
or creating, or in
any way contributing
to serious human
rights violations.
And I have to say
the responses that we
get from some of these companies
is pretty unimpressive.
We found a Massachusetts based
company called Thermo Fisher
Scientific that was selling
DNA sequencers to the Xinjiang
Public Security Bureau
at the same time
that we were documenting those
authorities forcibly gathering
information.
And I want to be very
clear about this.
We were not able to show that
that company's sequencers were
necessarily being
used in that campaign.
But we wrote to
them and said, you
need to be aware that this
campaign is happening.
What steps are you
taking to make sure
that your technology
is not being used?
Well, it took about 18
months, letters from us,
interventions from
members of Congress,
and finally an expose
by The New York Times
to get the company
to stop selling
that particular technology
in that particular region.
But we still don't have an
answer from them or from lots
of other companies.
And bear in mind, this
is a region where there's
a lot of investment from major
companies like Halliburton
or Volkswagen. What steps
are they taking to make sure
that they are not
complicit in forced labor,
in creating the technological
architecture of repression?
These are all
companies that say they
have corporate social
responsibility policies,
and we certainly hope
that they take seriously
the reputational
risk that they run,
as well as the potential
to actually set
a positive standard by
making sure they're not
part of the problem.
We can also talk about the
role of big Chinese tech
companies that have
been implicated
in abuses in Xinjiang that
are investing worldwide
and our concerns
about that, too.
But you guys may want
to jump in on this.
MR. SEYTOFF: Sure.
In our reports, we did cover
some of the Chinese companies
that were involved, high tech
companies especially, using
facial recognition because
the way the Chinese government
controls the Uighur population
who are not in the internment
camps but outside is
using those large numbers
of facial recognition cameras.
They are pretty much
everywhere, in addition
to the police checkpoints.
So they have those cameras.
They can recognize the face
of the Uighurs and others.
And also with the
work of the U.S.
scientists help the China with
the separating the Uighur DNA
from the Chinese DNA,
so they can effectively
separate the Uighurs from
other non-Uighur population
in the region.
So the Uighurs who
are living outside,
although technically,
they are not in the camps,
but under this high
tech Orwellian stay,
it is like they
also live in a camp.
So the Western companies,
a lot of these companies,
and a lot of this Western,
American, and European,
Australian, who knows?
And all of these
scientists, they also
work closely with the Chinese
government and their research
facilities.
Basically they are, in a
way, also aiding and abetting
Chinese government and
perpetuating the police state.
MR. ANDREWS: All right.
We have a question
from our audience.
Do the three of you believe
that life in the Uighur region
could improve or return to,
quote, "normal" in the future
under the Chinese
Communist Party
like it was before 2009
or at least before 2016?
Is it still possible under
Chinese communist rule?
MR. TURKEL: I'll take
a jab at that question.
I think it will be very
difficult for Uighurs
at least for at least
two or three generations
to have a normal life.
Because the oppression
has been so brutal.
The Uighur people
are proud people,
resilient people, a
brave people by nature.
But the current wave of
oppression, this level
of brutality can break anyone.
The Uighur spirit
is still there,
but the normalcy of Uighur
livelihood, families,
have been broken.
So it will be
impossible for me to say
that life will be back to
normal in two weeks, in a month,
even a year because
this is massive.
We're talking about more
than 10% of the population,
at least based on
what we know remotely,
through satellite imageries,
or the government construction
bids, kind of a
calculation of percentage.
So the large number of
people already been affected,
even people who are
outside of the country
have been affected by this.
So a kind of normalcy is
very difficult to imagine.
But what I worry the most is
that either Chinese win or lose
in this effort to stamp out the
Uighur ethno-national identity
of religion.
If they fail with such a
big investment and such
a massive detention,
what are they
going to do with people
in their custody?
Well, if they succeed, our
Uighur ethno-national identity
will be destroyed, at least
for the individuals who
live in China proper.
MR. SEYTOFF: Yeah,
we have interviewed
the survivors of the camps.
And if you listen to them,
their stories are extremely not
just heartbreaking, and
you can see not just
the physical torture part,
but the psychological torture,
the effects of psychological
torture on those people.
And these are not people who
had committed any criminals.
They are just
ordinary people that
happen to be Uighurs,
happen to be religious,
or happen to pray
five times a day,
or went to mosque regularly,
or went to study in,
for example, Egypt.
Then upon return,
the Chinese are
going to detain them
for a month, now years.
And even if they
are released, they
are not coming out in their
previous normal state.
So a lot of them have
psychological problems.
And the survivors, when
you listen to them,
what they had witnessed,
even though some of them
may or may not
have been tortured,
what they had witnessed
a torture if there
is a death in the
camps, all of them
is already an extremely
horrifying experience for them.
The psychological pain that
has inflicted upon them
is lifelong.
There is no medicine
that can help them.
And a lot of them
develop, like in a way,
PTSD kind of syndrome.
Not just the Uighurs in
this detention facility
or even outside, what you are
seeing with the Uighurs outside
who have lost in touch
with their parents,
with their loved ones,
husbands, wives, and even
their own kids for the
past several years,
they are also having problems.
We did at least two stories.
One Uighur in Turkey recognized
his own son in China.
Basically, the Chinese
police official
is asking his son to
repeat Chinese propaganda
in the Chinese language.
And so this man told us that--
he basically said he saw
his own son being culturally
assimilated, maybe eating pork
now, and at the end of the day,
he may grow up,
become my own enemy.
And another Uighur
lady also in Turkey
recognized her own
daughter, just a 6,
7-year-old daughter in a Chinese
government propaganda video,
that she was basically
speaking in Chinese,
repeating Chinese
propaganda as well.
And these parents'
hearts have been broken.
They cannot see
their own children.
They cannot take custody
of their children.
They can do nothing
for their own children.
In addition to that,
we also did a lot
of reporting about the children
of the detained parents.
In a lot of cases,
both parents have been
detained by the Chinese state.
And the children left, sometimes
left with the grandparents.
They're aging and ailing,
cannot take care of the kids.
Then the Chinese government
takes them to the orphanages,
and there, the government
basically brainwash them.
No Uighur language
education, no Uighur food.
There is no love, there
aren't parents, no care.
It's just state foster care
and cultural assimilation.
And recently, just German
researcher Adrian Zenz
called that, that is
cultural genocide, basically,
what China is doing especially
to the Uighur children,
bringing up the next
generation of Uighurs
without any kind of Uighur
tradition, Uighur education,
or Islamic faith.
MR. ANDREWS: Right.
We have another question from
the field from Danurswari
joining from AtAmerica
in Jakarta, Indonesia.
What can the world be
doing for Muslims in China
to make them feel safe?
Sophie?
DR. RICHARDSON:
Sure, I'll try that.
I mean, one of the most
urgent things to do is to,
for people who are
concerned around the world
about this situation,
is to press
their own governments
to challenge
China over these policies.
And we were very encouraged
when a few weeks ago,
a group of 24 governments
submitted a letter expressing
concern about Xinjiang
and asking for access
to the region for
international observers,
like the UN's High
Commissioner for Human Rights.
That letter was submitted to the
President of the Human Rights
Council.
And China quickly
countered by organizing
a letter that had 50
signatories, including,
disturbingly, a
number of governments
that themselves represent
large numbers of Muslims.
And I think it's
especially painful
to see a lack of solidarity.
And so to the extent that
civic groups or faith based
groups are willing to press
their own governments to join
a positive rights-oriented
critique of China,
I think that's an
incredibly important step.
But also, I think what Nury
and Alim have just described
is important and so moving.
And I think we're in awe of
people in the community who
are fighting so hard and
in such a dignified way,
among other things now,
to preserve culture,
to teach language, to keep
religious practices alive,
even if they can only
do it in the diaspora.
But I think there's
a lot of room
for supporting those
kinds of efforts,
too, so that when the
time comes, that things
are different for
Uighurs and other Turkic
Muslims inside the country,
that there are still--
there are texts to teach kids.
There's been preservation
of cultural traditions
to go back to that there's sort
of a repository of these kinds
of practices that can be
referred to in hopes that it
can, again, be transmitted from
one generation to the next.
And to the extent that
that can be supported
outside the country, I think
that's a very important kind
of work to do, too.
MR. TURKEL: The late
Senator John McCain once
said that the hope is the best
weapon against the oppression.
The Uighur people
desperately need hope.
The joint letter
that Sophie is citing
is one of those examples.
Give exactly the
desperately needed hope
for the Uighur people.
And that makes them feel safe
because they believe that,
and they will see that as a
sign that the world is speaking
for them in the face of this
oppressive regime, that has not
been feeling or
experiencing seeing
any cause for their brutality.
So as a community,
as a government,
collectively or individually,
have to speak out,
especially the Muslim countries.
It's disheartening that the
Chinese government relying
on their Muslim allies to
justify their oppression,
their war on Islam.
This sounds like a
political statement,
but they are systematically,
very deliberately
trying to debase Uighur Islam.
Especially the Muslim people
in liberal Muslim societies
have to realize that their
religion is under attack.
MR. ANDREWS: All three
of you are very connected
to the diaspora community.
And Volz Jack asks, what are the
current efforts in the United
States to help Kazakh and
Uighur political immigrants come
to the United States?
Nury, I'd like to
direct this one to you
in light of the recent
asylum of Ablikim Yusuf.
MR. TURKEL: The Uighur
American community
has been very vocal,
organized, active, effective.
Because there is an
organization, and also
very united.
The diaspora community
exists in the United States.
And one effective method
that the Uighur Americans
have been using is to
utilize their access
to their government officials.
In the United States
Congress, there
are two pieces of legislation
have been considered.
Just a quick example, that the
Uighur Americans come together,
went to the United States
Congress, knocking on doors
and handing out pamphlets,
educating staff members.
That's one of the
legislative advocacy efforts
that the Uighurs have
been undertaking.
They are also in regular contact
with the government officials.
In addition to the
government contacts,
Uighur American community
is also very active,
engaging with NGOs, such
as Sophie's organization,
providing information,
updating, recommending
individual survivors, the
victims, to tell those stories.
And also Radio
Free Asia happened
to be in Washington, DC.
So this has been a
collaborative effort.
As a result, we have
delightfully good visibility,
credibility, and a
working relationship
with people from media,
government, and NGOs.
So this should be a model
that the other Uighur
communities around the
world should consider.
As for the asylum, the asylum
claim has not been made yet.
The gentleman just
arrived yesterday
with the help of NGOs such
as Sophie's organization,
my organization.
And then the U.S.
government, obviously,
managed to rescue
this individual who
was in a life and death
situation just three days ago.
In something related
to the asylum claim,
the United States government
has been very supportive
of the Uighur refugees.
I could say this with certainty
that the Uighurs enjoy
one of the highest asylum
approval rate in this country,
despite the fact that the
process has been slowed down.
But on the merits, Uighurs
have a pretty high percentage
of approval rate
compared to other asylum
seekers in the United States.
DR. RICHARDSON:
Let's also just make
sure to give credit
in this recent case
to authorities in Qatar for not
putting Mr. Yusuf on a plane
back to China and recognizing
that that was not an option.
We have seen other governments
like Germany and Sweden now
effectively say publicly that
they will not send people back.
And so I think more
governments are waking up
to the serious threats
that Uighurs would
face if they were sent back.
And it would be good to see more
publicly take that position.
There are other governments that
implicitly are of that view,
but I think being clear about
that at a time when I think
people's well-founded
fear of persecution
is even more pronounced
would be a positive step.
MR. SEYTOFF: Yeah, we need a
lot of reporting on the Uighurs
in Egypt in 2017.
Thousands of Uighurs
had no choice
but to return because their
parents were held hostage
by the Chinese authorities,
basically forcing those Uighur
students in Egypt to return.
And a lot of them, out
of love their parents,
had no choice but to return.
Some of them were able to
escape to countries like Turkey
and other countries.
And with the support of
Egyptian authorities,
and the Chinese government
was able to have most of them
return, some of them
basically detained
by the Egyptian authorities
and sent them, deport them back
to China.
And most of those Uighurs
were detained in the camps.
We were also able to
verify some of the Uighurs
who came back
basically from Egypt
to actually even tortured
to death in this detention,
in these internment camps.
And other countries like
Pakistan and Central Asian
countries in the past did
deport Uighur dissidents back
to China.
They were sentenced to
life, some of them to death.
And some of them
simply disappeared.
MR. ANDREWS: Another
disturbing aspect of this issue
is the Chinese
government's repression
of religious and cultural
expression in Xinjiang.
This has taken
shape in many ways,
including the banning
of religious ceremonies,
public wearing of Islamic
dress, possession of Qurans,
and relatedly, forced
synthesization,
restricting the use of Uighur,
Kazakh, and other languages,
and imposing pro Chinese
Communist Party ideology.
Alim, can you share
your insights on this?
MR. SEYTOFF: Sure.
Uighurs are Muslims.
Uighurs have accepted Islam
for more than 1,000 years.
Islam is part of
Uighur identity,
and Uighur culture is Islamic.
And being Muslims, of course,
you have religious duties,
and you have
religious ceremonies.
And being Muslim,
you need to pray.
You need to go to mosque.
You need to learn the Quran.
And also being Muslim from birth
to death, it's all religious.
You name your child, and that's
your basic right as parents.
You give them Muslim names.
But the Chinese government
banned the Uighur parents
from giving certain
names to their children.
So it's no longer the choice
and the rights of their parents
to give the names
to their own kids.
And Uighurs also for boys,
they have circumcision.
And that's a religious event.
When Uighur man and
woman get married,
it's a religious event.
Imam's involved, a
prayer is involved,
religious blessing's involved.
All of this have been
practically outlawed
by the Chinese government
with what Nury earlier stated,
the de-extremification
regulation.
And studying Quran,
and possessing Quran,
and possessing religious apps
on your phone, all of them
are deemed extremist
by the authorities.
We did a number of
reports on all of this.
And going to a country
like Egypt to study Islam,
and that's a sign of extremism.
And going to one of the Muslim
countries like Saudi Arabia
or even Qatar, that is also--
now that if you're upon return,
they will detain you because
you went to the Muslim country.
If you want to eat
halal as a Muslim,
you cannot eat pork
and drink alcohol,
which are both
forbidden in Islam.
That's a sign of extremism.
And you have to
eat pork together.
That's what is being promoted
by the Chinese government.
And now you cannot label any
Uighur restaurant as a halal
restaurant.
Not only that, just last
week, the Chinese government
took down all the signs of
halal in restaurants in Beijing,
for example.
It's not only happening for
the Uighurs-- for the Kazakh,
Kyrgyz--
everybody who is Muslim.
And we had a report that Uighurs
who got married to a government
official, got married
with a religious ceremony,
then they were detained because
that's a sign of extremism.
So everything Uighurs
do in terms of religion,
this is labeled as
the sign of extremists
by the Chinese authorities.
Basically, the
Chinese government
doesn't want the Uighur
people to believe in Islam,
to practice Islam, to
pass on Islamic knowledge
to their own children.
Just last week, the
Chinese government
had their white paper on
the Uighurs on Xinjiang.
On that, two key points.
Basically one that are
stating that Uighurs are not
Turkic people.
The second major point
is about religion.
They say Uighur people did
not voluntarily accept Islam.
Islam came by force,
and the meaning
is because Islam came by force
more than 1,000 years ago,
that's why Uighurs should
accept Chinese Communist Party's
basically atheistic ideology.
And the Chinese government
also announced a few months ago
that the Chinese
government would
synthesize Islam,
basically change Islam
into a Chinese version of Islam.
China is run by the
Chinese Communist Party.
It's an atheist party.
And Chinese Communist Party sees
not just Islam, all religion,
like what Marx said.
A religion is an
opium to the masses.
So that's the view of
the Chinese government.
So it's unclear how China
wants to synthesize Islam.
So basically, any kind
of practice or expression
of Islam by the Uighurs
and other Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Muslim populations
is basically outlawed
by the Chinese
government at the moment.
MR. ANDREWS: And as
we've mentioned before,
clearly Chinese
disinformation on this issue
is pervasive and
unfortunately has
a strong effect on downplaying
the realities of life
for Muslim minorities
in Xinjiang.
Whether it's labeling of the
internment camps as, quote,
"re-education camps" or
framing the repressive tactics
in Xinjiang as fighting,
quote, terrorism and secession,
this tactic has been used to
block and divide international
criticism, especially with
majority Muslim countries.
So briefly, what effect has
the Chinese government's
false portrayal of their
treatment of Muslim minorities
had on sidelining important
Muslim and Turkish voices
around the world?
So just a reminder to keep
your answers brief as possible.
We're running out of time.
We want to make sure we get
as many questions as possible.
But please, Sophie, you
want to take that question?
DR. RICHARDSON:
Well, very quickly.
I mean, look, any government's
disinformation is problematic.
But I think what we
need to focus on here
are the facts and
assessing independently
and credibly what
specifically is happening.
I mean, the Chinese
government has
gone to institutions like
the Human Rights Council
and been wildly dishonest
about its policies there.
And it is precisely
on these issues.
Is detention voluntary or not?
How many people are there?
Are these people somehow guilty
of actually committing a crime?
If not, why are they detained?
It's assessing
those facts through
an independent and credible
institution that's essential.
And that's why if
China is to have
any credibility on this
issue, those questions
have to be posed by
credible outside observers
and not just a battle of
the propaganda departments.
That's not going
to help anybody.
MR. TURKEL: Not only it's not
credible, it's unverifiable.
There's no way of verifying
what the Chinese government has
been floating around.
They've been very effective
changing the narrative
or changing the--
restructuring the headline.
DR. RICHARDSON: Hosting
propaganda for us.
MR. TURKEL: Hosting
propaganda tourists
to visit Potemkin villages.
But the truth is
that this is not
about terrorism, number one.
Number two, and
Chinese government
is even violating its
counter-terrorism law.
There's no due process.
There's no nothing-- no access
to lawyers, no courts, nothing.
People have been
indefinitely detained.
And three, this is not about
re-educating university
professor, well-known scholars.
They don't need education.
Doctors don't need education.
The university professors
don't need education.
Stage actors don't
need education.
Athletes once glorifying
China's government
don't need a re-education.
This is all bogus
way of justifying
their brutal behavior.
So the world needs
to be mindful.
There's nothing to
be verified and to be
acceptable about this behavior.
You cannot just lock up someone
based on their ethnicity
and religion under the claim
of fighting against extremism.
MR. ANDREWS: It looks
like we have time for one
or two last questions
from our online viewers.
Pete Erwin asks, how do we
combat the Chinese government's
claim that the Uighur
issue is merely
a tool of Western governments
to criticize China and not
a true human rights crisis?
MR. SEYTOFF: We have through
our reporting at Radio Free
Asia, for the past three
years, especially the past two
years, I would say,
since April 2017,
we have been able to confirm
there are large scale
detentions.
And there are all
kinds of evidence.
It's not just
Radio Free Asia who
have done an excellent
job I believe.
And in addition to that, the
Chinese government targeted
a Radio Free Asia journalist--
detained their parents,
loved ones.
They are still in detention.
That's not something
we're making up.
And in addition to
that, satellite images.
They can't see the camps
from satellite images.
If they can have unfettered
access, whether that's
UN, or special rapporteurs,
or foreign governments,
if they could request
unfettered access,
they would be able to see the
real nature of these camps.
It is, as Sophie and
then Nury talked about,
the disinformation campaign.
And also the Chinese government
using their investment,
buying other countries
to stand on the side
of the Chinese
government to spread
more disinformation
like they are
helping the local population.
but all evidence, especially
through our reports,
prove that that's
not the case there.
MR. ANDREWS: Right.
And we have a final question
from MyAmerica Jakarta.
An audience member asks,
what can young people
do to prevent China
from continuing
this practice in the future?
Also, how can we
prevent another country
from imposing these same
regulations on a population
within its borders?
DR. RICHARDSON: I'll take a stab
at the youth activism question
because I think the engagement
of young people in politics
and human rights
issues worldwide
is probably one of the most
reassuring trends in the world
today.
Look, engage your
own governments.
Get out and talk to
your own communities.
Reach out to the Uighur diaspora
communities in your country,
and get to know people, and take
some cues from them about what
sort of support they need.
I think it's precisely
that kind of welcoming,
and communication, and
collaborative work that,
among other things, is very
hard for governments to ignore.
MR. TURKEL: The
Chinese government
already been in the process of
exporting these technologies,
these methods.
New York Times reported
about 18 countries already
adopted the Chinese
way of dealing
with political resentment
through technology.
So this needs to
be talked about.
If they talk enough
about this, and that
will force the government
to take an action.
MR. ANDREWS: OK, it looks
like we're almost out of time.
Thank you all for your
questions and comments.
We've really covered
a lot of ground today.
Hopefully, those of
you watching will
continue engaging on
this critical issue.
Sophie, do you have any
final thoughts to share?
DR. RICHARDSON:
Just this one, which
is that I think if any
government in the world
other than China's
was committing abuses
on this scale towards
a Muslim population,
we would see a very
different response.
Imagine if the U.S. was doing
this or some other government.
And I think on some level,
the world's response
to the crisis for
Uighurs is fundamentally
about holding China
to the same standard
that all other
governments are expected
to live by under international
human rights law,
and that to fail on
this issue will really
be to embolden
China to commit more
and different kinds
of violations inside
and outside the
country, which I think
speaks to some of the questions
that, implicitly, some
of your viewers have
been asking about.
MR. ANDREWS: And
Nury, how about you?
Very briefly.
MR. TURKEL: This is not
about the Uighurs anymore.
This should be a global
concern for the citizens who
can express their views and can
influence their governments.
And also, this is a
matter for governments
to focus on a human aspect,
human toll of what's
happening in China, not on
the political expediency.
At the end of the
day, the history
will not be kind
to those who are
feigning ignorance
or focusing too
much on their political
interest, or their leadership,
or maintaining their
leadership role.
And finally, I worry
that if this is not
treated as an urgent
matter, I think
we're kind of
getting used to it,
and this will become
the new normal.
I don't think it's
good for humanity.
MR. ANDREWS: And Alim,
your final thoughts.
MR. SEYTOFF: My
final thoughts are
this is not some
American propaganda,
as the Chinese
government stated.
This is real, and
this is happening
to millions of Uighur people.
And every Uighur in exile
has one or more relatives
who are in those
detention camps now,
who have not been able to be in
touch for the last two years.
MR. ANDREWS: I'd like
to think all three
of you and for your important
work that you're all doing.
So thank you and
to our audience.
And we'd like to acknowledge
AtAmerica and MyAmerica
in Jakarta, Indonesia
for hosting viewing
groups for today's program.
In closing, I'd like
to thank our panelists
for their important insights.
Hopefully this
discussion can serve
as a catalyst for
greater awareness
of the abuses in Xinjiang
and the critical role we all
play in confronting them.
Thank you, and have a good day.
