The Uyghur rights activists organized a protest against the atrocities committed by China on the Uyghur communities in Xinjiang.
The East Turkistan Government in Exile, the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement, and the Free Kazakhs Organization held a protest at the United Nations headquarters to draw attention of the world to the China’s atrocities in the East Turkistan against the Uyghur community. See here.
This demonstration was organized following rumors that China was urging UN human rights Chief Michelle Bachelet to withhold a widely anticipated report on China’s atrocities against Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan.
“We call on the UN and its member states to not allow China to manipulate the UN system,” said Prime Minister Salih Hudayar of the East Turkistan Government in Exile in a statement in front of the UN Headquarters in New York.
“We demand that the UN stop ignoring China’s ongoing genocide in East Turkistan, and we demand that the UN release its report on China’s ongoing genocide in East Turkistan immediately,” he added further.
The statement claims that after Xi Jinping’s trip to East Turkistan in May 2014, the Chinese government embarked on its comprehensive campaign of genocide against the Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic peoples.
The statement also stated that the UN had largely disregarded China’s Holocaust-like genocide in the twenty-first century.
Millions of ethnic Turks were sent to prisons, slave labor camps, and concentration camps where they were tortured, brainwashed, raped, forced to get sterilized, and even executed extra judicially. And this inhuman campaign of genocide still continues.
The fascist Chinese government has been committing genocide against Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic peoples for the past eight years with impunity, according to Haider Jan, the community outreach coordinator for the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement. He further alleged that this is happening due to the inaction of the UN Human Rights Council, the UN General Assembly, and the UN Security Council.
He continued, “The UN and its member states must take action to stop China’s ongoing genocide and respect their obligations under the UN Genocide Convention and the UN Charter.”
A Uyghur woman, Tursunay Ziyawudun, who is a participant in the protest today and a survivor of an Uyghur concentration camp, issued a warning that, “Time is running out for the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan.”
She further added that “the UN General Assembly should also adopt a resolution to recognize and act on China’s ongoing genocide of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic peoples in East Turkistan before it is too late.”
The East Turkistan Government in Exile again calls on the international community to uphold its commitments under the UN Genocide Convention by taking meaningful action, including humanitarian intervention if necessary, to end China’s ongoing campaign of genocide in East Turkistan.
The exiled government of East Turkistan once more appealed to the international community to fulfill its obligations under the UN Genocide Convention by adopting effective action—including, if necessary, humanitarian intervention—to stop China’s ongoing genocide campaign in East Turkistan.
The East Turkistan Government in Exile went on to say that the only way to guarantee the freedoms, human rights, and very existence of Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples is to restore East Turkistan’s legitimate independence.
The Uyghurs are a comparatively small Turkic ethnic group that is primarily Muslim and whose ancestors can be found in Central and East Asia.
It is believed that they are native to the People’s Republic of China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
In addition to being Muslim and not speaking Mandarin as a first language, the Uyghurs also have a distinct ethnicity and culture from those of the rest of China.
The majority of Han Chinese have dominated the better occupations in Xinjiang during the past few decades as economic prosperity has spread there. As a result, the Uyghurs have felt as though their way of life and sense of identity are under danger.
