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PRESS RELEASE: WUC Concerned by Recent Attempts to Disrupt Uyghur Related Academic Events

PRESS RELEASE: WUC Concerned by Recent Attempts to Disrupt Uyghur Related Academic Events

Press Release – For immediate release
18 February 2019
Contact: World Uyghur Congress www.uyghurcongress.org
0049 (0) 89 5432 1999 or [email protected]

The World Uyghur Congress condemns recent attempts to disrupt academic events relating to Uyghur issues. A disturbing trend has emerged involving Chinese students or officials interrupting or intimidating Uyghur activists and academics presenting on the human rights crisis in East Turkistan in several Western countries. It is a clear attempt to silence discussion of the grave human rights violations perpetrated against the Uyghur people and to censor academic discourse.

On February 11, a Uyghur activist in Canada, Rukiye Turdush, was interrupted during her speech at an event organized by the Muslim Students Association and Muslims’ for Justice and Peace at McMaster University in Canada. Chinese students filmed and shouted over her during her speech and insulted her personally.

According to the Washington Post, news of Ms. Turdush’s talk spread quickly over the Chinese messaging app WeChat and several Chinese students contacted the Chinese embassy. The students were reportedly told to monitor the event and note if any university staff attended. Numerous media outlets and activists alleged that the Chinese consulate was directly involved in orchestrating the disruption in an attempt to shut down discussion about conditions in East Turkistan – at least one million Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims are held in what many Western experts have called concentration camps.

This is not, however, the first time official Chinese representatives have directly intervened in a Uyghur-related academic event. On January 24, an academic conference on the Uyghur crisis, held at Strasbourg university, was disrupted by two Chinese individuals who interrupted the conference and later distributed a Chinese government White Paper published in 2017, which alleges that no human rights violations are being perpetrated against Uyghurs. The two men presented themselves as students at the university, but were later shown to work for the Chinese consulate in Strasbourg.

Another event focusing on Uyghur issues at Duke University on January 28 was interrupted by Chinese students. The event, entitled ‘China’s Concentration Camps: What’s at Stake?’, featured talks by a survivor of of one of the camps, Mihrigul Tursun, as well as Aydin Anwar, a Uyghur activist in the United States. During the event, the speakers were shouted at by several Chinese students and subjected to personal insults. The students also reportedly handed out documents to attendees, calling Ms. Tursun a ‘deliberate liar’. Ms. Anwar also reported that speakers were subjected to death threats after the event.

It is unacceptable that academic discussions and Uyghur activists in particular are being targeted and disrupted. The direct interference of Chinese officials in an independent academic event is an affront to freedom of expression and academic freedom in a Western democratic country. It should be of major concern to policy-makers that the rights of their own citizens and residents are being violated by a foreign power. While the Chinese government often invokes the concept of sovereignty and non-interference when its human rights record is criticized, it evidently sees no problem directly interfering in the affairs of other states.

“The cornerstone of free and equal societies is the ability to engage in open and constructive debates on serious topics, free from intimidation, surveillance and acts of reprisals,” WUC President Dolkun Isa stated. He continued, “National governments have a responsibility to protect academic freedom, freedom of expression and to ensure that those who dare to speak out about serious human rights violations are not silenced by repressive foreign powers.”