🔗 Share this article

In the summer of 2021, Zeynure Hasan was at her home in Turkey's largest city when she answered a long-awaited phone call from her husband. It had been four agonizing days since their last contact, when he was getting ready to take a flight to Morocco. The silence had been difficult.

But the update her husband Idris revealed was more devastating. He told her that upon landing in Morocco, he had been arrested and jailed. Authorities stated he would be deported to China. "Reach out to anyone who can rescue me," he urged, before the line went dead.

Existence as Ethnic Minority in Exile

Zeynure, 31 years old, and Idris, 37, are members of the mostly Muslim community, which makes up about 50% of the residents in China's north-western Xinjiang region. Over the last ten years, more than a 1,000,000 Uyghurs are estimated to have been imprisoned in so-called "re-education camps," where they faced mistreatment for ordinary actions like going to a mosque or wearing a headscarf.

The couple had joined thousands of Uyghurs who escaped to Turkey during the previous decade. They hoped they would find refuge in their new home, but soon realized they were mistaken.

"Authorities informed me that the Chinese government threatened to shut down all its industrial plants in the nation if Morocco released him," she said.

After moving in Istanbul, Zeynure worked as an language instructor, while Idris began as a translator and designer, assisting to publish Uyghur media and publications. They had a family of three kids and felt free to practice as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's best friends, who was employed in a library stocking Uyghur books, was detained in the mid-year of 2021, Idris panicked. News indicated that Beijing was urging Turkey to deport Uyghurs. Idris felt at risk due to his prior arrest, which he believed was linked to his work with activists and promoting Uyghur culture. He decided to escape to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had expired, had to remain with the children until her husband could request a visa for the whole family.

A Terrible Error

Leaving Turkey turned out to be a disastrous decision. At the Istanbul airport, border control officials pulled him aside for questioning. "When he was eventually allowed to get on the plane, he told me how relieved he was that they had released him, but it felt like a trap to me," she said. Her worst fears were confirmed when he was removed from the plane and detained by border officials.

Over the last ten years, China has been utilizing the global police agency Interpol to pursue dissidents and had asked for Idris to be added on the agency's most-wanted "red notice list." Zeynure claims Turkish officials allowed him board the flight knowing he would be arrested upon landing in Morocco.

What happened next would convince her to do what many Uyghurs fear most: challenge China, despite the risks.

Parental Interference

Soon after learning of her husband's arrest, Zeynure received an unexpected phone call from her parents in Xinjiang. She had been cut off from her relatives since they visited her in Turkey in 2016 and were imprisoned for several months upon their return to China.

Her parents had a disturbing message. "They told me, 'We know your husband is not with you. Maybe we can help you,'" Zeynure stated. "I knew there must be some authorities there with them and just acted like I didn't know anything. But they insisted and told me not to do anything to help my husband. 'Avoid doing anything except caring for your children,' they told me. 'Avoid saying anything bad about China.'"

But with her husband's safety at stake, the quiet-mannered Zeynure was not going to remain silent. She had been raised seeing women having their head coverings ripped off in public by the authorities and had been resolved to live in a country with freedom of belief.

"Prior to my husband was arrested in Morocco, I didn't do anything. I was just looking after my family; I didn't even have Facebook or Twitter. But I had to do something to rescue my husband – I had to tell the reality to the international community. Everyone knows Uyghurs deported to China will be tortured or die. They pushed me to raise my voice."

Childhood in Xinjiang

Zeynure has different types of memories of her childhood in Xinjiang. The first was of happy days spent in the countryside with her grandparents, who were agricultural workers. "I'd play with the sheep and poultry. I don't know if I will ever have that type of opportunity again. The relatives around the home and land. It was too beautiful, like a scene from a story."

The second was as a religious minority in Xinjiang, of vacations interrupted by mandatory teachings of "political anthems" and being banned from going to the mosque or practicing Ramadan.

China claims it is tackling extremism through 'managing unauthorized religious activities' and 'training facilities', but other nations, including the US, say its actions amount to genocide. Zeynure says she never felt free to follow her faith in Xinjiang. "Individuals who went on religious journey to Mecca abroad were arrested and transferred to jail and told they must have some problem in their brain.

"They wanted Uyghur people to forget their faith and heritage. They said 'you should believe in us, we provided you jobs and this beautiful life here'," says Zeynure.

She finally decided to leave China after returning home from college in another part of China to a growing crackdown on beliefs in 2011. It was then that she was connected to Idris by one of her school friends. "She knew we both had made the decision to go overseas and told us maybe we could meet and go together."

Zeynure says she was immediately reassured by Idris. "I saw he was very honest and shy, and couldn't tell lies or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to marry me, but Idris was different."

Fresh Start in Turkey

Within two months they were wed and ready to move for a new life in Turkey. They knew it was an Islamic country with many Muslims and Uyghurs already living there, with a comparable language and common ethnicity. "It was like Uyghurs' alternative homeland," says Zeynure. As a teacher and designer, they could also support the community in diaspora. "There are many kids now in China growing up without Uyghur culture or language so we think it's our duty to not let it die out," she says.

But their sense of safety at finding a secure location abroad was short-lived. Beijing has become a global leader in pursuing dissidents living in exile through the use of electronic surveillance, intimidation and physical assault. But what Idris was faced was a more recent method of control: using China's increasing economic leverage to pressure other countries to yield to its demands, including detaining and extraditing Uyghurs it wants to suppress.

Fighting for Release

After the call from Idris, and learning he had an Interpol red notice against him, Zeynure knew she only had a limited time of opportunity to try to prevent his deportation to China. She immediately reached out to as many Uyghur advocacy organizations as she could find advertised on the internet in the EU and the US and pleaded for assistance. She was brave despite China having already shown a willingness to target the family members of other targets.

Zeynure started protesting with her children at the Moroccan embassy in Istanbul, and sharing information on online platforms. To her surprise, copycat protests soon followed in Morocco calling for Idris's freedom. Moroccan officials were compelled to put out a announcement saying his extradition was a matter for the judicial system to determine.

In early August 2021, Interpol cancelled Idris's alert after being pressed to reexamine his case by advocacy organizations. But that did not prevent a Moroccan court later ruling he should still be extradited to China. Zeynure says there was significant political influence from Beijing, which made {little sense|