Uyghur county inside China has highest prison percentage inside the world
BEIJING (AP) — Nearly one inside 25 people inside a county inside the Uyghur heartland of China has been sentenced to prison on terrorism-related charges, inside what is the highest known imprisonment percentage inside the world, an Associated Press analysis of leaked facts shows.
A list obtained with every one other accompanied by partially verified by the AP cites the names of additional than 10,000 Uyghurs sent to prison inside fair Konasheher county alone, one of dozens inside southern Xinjiang. In recent years, China has waged a brutal crackdown on the Uyghurs, a mostly Muslim minority, which it has described while a war on terror.
The list is by a lengthy way the biggest to emerge to day accompanied by the names of imprisoned Uyghurs, reflecting the sheer dimensions of a Chinese management military operation by which an estimated million or additional people were swept into internment camps with every one other accompanied by prisons. It too confirms what families with every one other accompanied by rights groups have said for years: China is relying on a system of long-term incarceration to retain the Uyghurs inside check, wielding the rules and regulations while a weapon of repression.
Under searing international criticism, Chinese officials announced the closure inside 2019 of short-term, extrajudicial internment camps where Uyghurs were thrown inside lacking charges. However, although observation focused on the camps, thousands of Uyghurs still languish for years or flat decades inside prison on what experts speak are trumped-up charges of terrorism.
Uyghur farmer Rozikari Tohti was known while a soft-spoken, family-loving male accompanied by trio children with every one other accompanied by not the slightest attentiveness inside religion. So his cousin, Mihrigul Musa, was shocked to find Tohti had been thrown into prison for five years for "religious extremism." She said she knew others additional probable to exist swept up inside Xinjiang's crackdown on religion, such while another cousin who prayed every one week, nevertheless not Tohti.
"Never did I believe he would exist arrested," said Musa, who now lives inside exile inside Norway. "If you saw him, you would be in touch the same way. He is so earnest."
From the list, Musa found not here Tohti's younger male sibling casual broBritish casual bruvver Abilikim Tohti too was sentenced to septet years on charges of "gathering the condition to interrupt communal order." Tohti's next-door neighbor, a farmer called Nurmemet Dawut, was sentenced to 11 years on the same charges while well while "picking quarrels with every one other accompanied by provoking trouble."
Konasheher county is representative of rural southern Xinjiang, with every one other accompanied by additional than 267,000 people exist there. The prison sentences across the county were for set of two to 25 years, accompanied by an signify of nine years, the list shows. While the people on the list were mostly arrested inside 2017, according to Uyghurs inside exile, their sentences are so lengthy that the vast majority would still exist inside prison.
Those swept up came from all walks of life, with every one other accompanied by included men, women, young people with every one other accompanied by the elderly. They had only one thing inside common: They were all Uyghurs.
Experts speak it clearly shows people were targeted simply for actuality Uyghur – a end vehemently denied by Chinese authorities. Xinjiang spokesperson Elijan Anayat said sentences were carried not here inside accordance accompanied by the law.
"We would never specifically mark specific regions, ethnic groups or religions, a a large amount of less the Uyghurs," Anayat said. "We would never incorrect the good, nor release the bad."
The list offers the widest with every one other accompanied by most granular look yet at who is inside prison inside Xinjiang. It was obtained by Xinjiang educational Gene Bunin from an anonymous spring who described themselves while a subscriber of China's Han Chinese majority "opposed to the Chinese government's policies inside Xinjiang."
The list was passed to The AP by Abduweli Ayup, an exiled Uyghur linguist inside Norway. The AP authenticated it into and not here of interviews accompanied by eight Uyghurs who recognized 194 people on the list, while well while legal notices, recordings of phone calls accompanied by Chinese officials with every one other accompanied by checks of address, birthdays with every one other accompanied by identity numbers.
The list does not include people accompanied by representative criminal charges such while homicide or theft. Rather, it focuses on offenses related to terrorism, devout extremism or vague charges traditionally used opposed to political dissidents, such while "picking quarrels with every one other accompanied by provoking trouble." This means the accurate number of people imprisoned is almost certainly higher.
But flat at a conservative estimate, Konasheher county's imprisonment percentage is additional than 10 times higher than that of the United States, one of the world's leading jailers, according to Department of Justice statistics. It's too additional than 30 times higher than for China while a whole, according to condition statistics from 2013, the last hour dated such figures were released.
Darren Byler, an expert on Xinjiang's pile incarceration system, said most arrests were arbitrary with every one other accompanied by external outside the law, accompanied by people detained for having relatives overseas or downloading sure cell phone applications. He has documented arrest quotas for local police, inside some cases resulting inside the men from entire villages actuality rounded up with every one other accompanied by whole families uprooted from their homes.
"It is really remarkable," Byler said. "In no indeed other location have we seen entire populations of people exist described while terrorists or seen while terrorists. .... The condition is trying to reframe the narrative with every one other accompanied by say, you know, all of these people are actually criminals."
China has struggled for decades to jurisdiction Xinjiang, where Uyghurs have lengthy resented Beijing's heavy-handed rule, resulting inside brutal clashes accompanied by the Han-dominated government. With the 9/11 attacks inside the United States, Chinese officials began using the specter of terrorism to justify firm controls.
The crackdown kicked into high gearwheel inside 2017, following a twine of knifings with every one other accompanied by bombings carried not here by a small handful of Uyghur militants. The Chinese management defended the pile detentions while both lawful with every one other accompanied by obligatory to combat terrorism.
In 2019, Xinjiang officials declared the short-term detention camps closed, with every one other accompanied by said that all of whom they described while "trainees" had "graduated." Visits by Associated Press journalists to quartet former bivouac sites confirmed that they were shuttered or converted into other facilities.
But the prisons remain. Xinjiang went on a prison-building spree inside tandem accompanied by the crackdown, with every one other accompanied by flat while the camps closed, the prisons expanded. At least a few bivouac sites were converted into centers for incarceration, including one that was turned into a pre-trial detention center twice the dimensions of Vatican City with every one other accompanied by estimated to have capacity for 10,000 people or more.
Satellite imagery obtained with every one other accompanied by analyzed by BuzzFeed suggests that by April 2021, the Chinese management had sufficient prison space inside Xinjiang to cover a third of the island of Manhattan. In the meantime, China declared favourable consequence inside keeping Xinjiang safe.
"In the past five years, Xinjiang has been without charge from brutal terrorist incidents," said China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi inside February. "People of all ethnicities have lived a contented with every one other accompanied by tranquil life."
China is using the rules and regulations "as a fig frondflag of legality" inside small portion to try with every one other accompanied by deflect international censure concerning holding Uyghurs, said Jeremy Daum, a criminal rules and regulations expert at Yale University's Paul Tsai China Center.
"But following the rules and regulations doesn't signify justice or fairness," said Daum, who reviewed the facts with every one other accompanied by was not associated accompanied by inside its leak. "It fair means it's 'legal.'"
Over the last eight years, experts say, Chinese authorities expanded the meaning of extremism to include displays of trust such while growing a lengthy beard or wearing a veil. Some charges for prisoners on the list are new with every one other accompanied by specific to Xinjiang, such while "preparing to convey not here terrorism," a ask in remittance that was newly defined inside 2016. The sheer volume of the convictions was "extraordinary," Daum added.
The plight of Nursimangul Abdureshid's family shows how inappropriately namedsupposed "students" released from internment camps tin simply exist sent to prisons by the Chinese management instead.
"It's a total lie, they fair try to whitewash their crime," said Abdureshid, who lives inside exile inside Turkey.
In 2017, a relative told Abdureshid that both her parents with every one other accompanied by her younger male sibling casual broBritish casual bruvver had been taken away to study, a euphemism referring to the short-term detention camps. It was only trio years later, inside 2020, that the Chinese embassy called her accompanied by details that all trio had been arrested with every one other accompanied by sentenced to prison for additional than a decade.
The leaked list was the earliest external outside confirmation of what had happened to her male sibling casual broBritish casual bruvver since that call, she said. Her brother, Memetali Abdureshid, 32, had been sentenced to 15 years with every one other accompanied by 11 months on charges of "picking quarrels with every one other accompanied by provoking trouble" with every one other accompanied by "preparing to convey not here terrorist activities."
Nursimangul Abdureshid saw eight names she recognized on the list, nevertheless not those of her parents. She with every one other accompanied by sextet other Uyghur exiles who spoke accompanied by the AP exist convinced by the list is incomplete since they did not see some people they were near to, meaning the imprisonment percentage could inside fact exist flat higher.
The secretive the natural world of the charges opposed to Memetali with every one other accompanied by others imprisoned is a scarlet flag, experts say. Although China makes legal records easily accessible otherwise, almost 90% of criminal records inside Xinjiang are not public.
The handful which have leaked show that people are actuality charged accompanied by "terrorism" for acts such while warning colleagues opposed to watching porn with every one other accompanied by swearing, or praying inside prison. In the most egregious cases, bivouac detainees were forced to confess their "crimes" inside category sham trials with every one other accompanied by transferred to prisons, accompanied by no indeed self-governing lawyers to protect them.
Another Uyghur from the township of Bulaqsu now living inside exile said he knew 100 people on the list, including neighbors with every one other accompanied by cousins. Included were fathers with every one other accompanied by sons, both sentenced to jail, said the man, who spoke on condition of anonymity not here of terror of retribution from Chinese authorities,
By the hour dated Mahmutohti Amin, 81, a former flavouring trader who lives inside Turkey, arrived inside the Kashgar neighbourhood of China inside 2017, his son, Ghappar Tohti, had been arrested. His other son, Polat Tohti, too was arrested, his daughter-in-law told him.
But Amin only found not here how lengthy their sentences were when he saw the list. Ghappar got septet years; Polat got 11.
Abduweli Ayup, the Uyghur exile who passed the list to the AP, has closely documented the ongoing repression of his community. But this list inside specific floored him: On it were neighbors, a cousin, a high educational organization teacher.
"I had collapsed," Ayup said. "I had told other people's stories …. with every one other accompanied by now this is me telling my own tale from my childhood."
The widely admired teacher, Adil Tursun, was the only one inside the high educational organization inside Toquzaq who could teach Uyghur students inside Chinese. He was a Communist Party subscriber who had formerly won a Model Worker award, with every one other accompanied by he tutored children throughout his without charge time. Every year, the students from his class had the finest chemistry trial scores inside the town.
The names of Tursun with every one other accompanied by others on the list made no indeed sensory power to Ayup since they were considered model Uyghurs. Some were flat eager to assimilate into the Han Chinese mainstream.
"The names of the crimes, spreading extremist thoughts, separatism…these charges are absurd," he said.
But when Ayup circulated the list among the Uyghur diaspora to inquire people to vouch for those they recognized, only eight not here of 30 agreed to speak publicly. Ayup was disappointed, yet nonetheless determined to document the lockdown of his people.
"We will come first in at the end, since we are on the side of justice," he said. "We are on the just side of history."
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Wu reported from Taipei, Taiwan.
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