Uyghur scholar and poet Aziz Isa Elkun has watched in anger as the Chinese government has waged war on the traditional music, dance, and poetry of his village home, and all the Turkic cultures of Xinjiang.
For World Poetry Day, we present three Uyghur poems (two of which are translated here for the first time into English) that tell stories of continuity and struggle: “Song of Nuzugum” by Tursun'ay Huseyin, “My Body is a Leaf” by Turghun Almas, and “Unending Song” by Téyipjan Éliyov.
March 8 is International Women’s Day and the month of March is Women's History Month. But there’s been nothing for Uyghur and other Muslim women to celebrate in Xinjiang.
Exiled linguist Abduweli Ayup is publishing books for children with the aim of ensuring the Uyghur language and cultural traditions never die despite the most repressive efforts of the Chinese state.
Uyghur exiles searching for loved ones are closer to answers thanks to a new internet search tool with access to more than 700,000 classified police records leaked from China last year.
He was a professor who worked within the Chinese state system to advocate for better treatment of the Uyghurs. His reward was a sentence to life in prison.
Erkin Tuniyaz, the most senior Uyghur Party official working for the Xinjiang government, was supposed to visit at least three European capitals. The trip was ‘postponed’ after a multinational, cross-party hue and cry.
Activists and a former victim of internment and forced labor sued the British government for failing to act on reports of forced labor in cotton supply chains. They lost the case, but say the wording of the judgment was an “important vindication” for persecuted Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other Muslim minorities.
The Uyghur diaspora is celebrating Canada's recent decision to accept 10,000 Uyghur refugees in the next two years. For them, there is finally hope of building a solid future.