An ethnic Kazakh Chinese national who is accused of illegally crossing the border to join her husband and two children in Kazakhstan says she was held in a secretive prison in China.
The 41-year-old’s testimony about her forced work in the camp system in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region that has drawn the most attention.
Beijing, denying the existence of prison camps for Muslims, has stepped up a crackdown in Xinjiang against what it calls separatist elements.
Reports from the United Nations said China is holding 1 million Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic minorities in re-education camps in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.The Chinese denial is appalling as there is no way it for it to deny the existence of such camps.
Many people reportedly gave accounts of the camps, the forced labour they endure and the bullying tactics used against them by Chinese officials.
These secretive “re-education camps” allegedly holding hundreds of thousands of people in the Muslim-majority region in western China are the focus of an explosive court case in Kazakhstan, testing the country’s ties with Beijing.
The report about the camps in which the Khazak woman was confined came out in the South China Morning Post on July 17.
At a public hearing, Sauytbay said she was granted access to classified documents that shed light on the sprawling network of re-education centres.
Besides the camps, Muslims in China are not allowed to go to the Hajj pilgrimmage. They are forced to leave China to seek permanent residence in countries that would grant them such facilities. Then only they can apply for Hajj visas to Saudi Arabia.There were also many reports of China bullying Muslims during the month of Ramadan, forcing them to eat during the day if they are Communist party workers or officials in the government.
Other reports stated – with evidence – that on Friday’s Muslims who are party officials or party workers and government workers are not barred from going for the Jumaah prayers.
All these reports are verifiable as true from Chinese Muslim who have escaped from China and are currently living outside the communist country.
An official who denied the existence of the camps however accepted the fact that China is trying to ‘re-educate’ those it feels have been drawn into extremism. This indicates China’s concerns towards the international community, saying those undergoing the ‘re-education’ in camps are terrorists and anti-nationalists.
But this will not pass among the free world.
Last Friday, UN committee member Gay McDougall cited reports that estimate 1.1 million people in Xinjiang are being held in political re-education camps. McDougall also noted reports of an additional 2 million people being required to take part in “open re-education camps.”
The camps are considered outside of China’s legal system. The Associated Press has reported that many remain in camps for months without formally being charged with anything.
Chinese government officials say they are fighting a rise in Islamic extremism as well as a separatist movement that calls for an independent Uyghur nation.
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : http://www.teebpost.com/china-lying-on-prison-camps-existence/