“My culture will survive”: the Uyghur poet Fatimah Abdulghafur Seyyah on her family’s devastating persecution

Cut adrift from her background, Seyyah uses poetry to preserve Uyghur culture and prevent it from being characterised by victimhood. “I’m scared of being defined by only genocide,” she says. “My culture is such a joyful, happy desert – it’s sandy, it’s shifting, it’s hot. My dad was always a happy person. I want my culture to be seen by the world as resilient. It’s been there for thousands of years. It will survive.”