All Reading

This section contains a curated list of useful articles, investigations, books and other reading materials. The list is updated on a weekly basis and suggestions for additions are welcome.

Starting Points:

Eyewitness Accounts

Overview Reports

Lists / Databases of Victims

Satellite Imagery of Camps, Prisons & Cultural Destruction

Lina K 27/05/2022 Lina K 27/05/2022

Uyghur voices in Istanbul

A Uyghur couple turns to music — inspired by the songs and poems of their culture — in response to the crisis in their homeland.

Lina K 02/03/2022 Lina K 02/03/2022

In Xinjiang, a new normal under a new chief — and also more of the same

Ma Xingrui, the new party secretary of Xinjiang, is tasked with repairing the damage left by his predecessor, Chen Quanguo, who initiated the largest internment of a religious minority since World War II. But he will also need to execute Beijing’s new policy of thwarting what it calls the “two plots.”

Lina K 29/12/2021 Lina K 29/12/2021

What can we expect from Xinjiang’s new Party boss Ma Xingrui?

As global pressure on Beijing mounts because of its repressive policies in Xinjiang, the Communist Party has brought in a new man to lead the region.

Lina K 16/12/2021 Lina K 16/12/2021

What is happening in Xinjiang as 2021 draws to a close?

A Q&A with Darren Byler, author of a new book on China’s oppressive policies against Uyghurs and other Muslims in western China. "In general, what we are seeing is a shift from mass internment to coerced labor and mass imprisonment [...] At the same time, those who are deemed more serious risks have either been sentenced to prison terms or are still being held as they await trial."

Lina K 07/07/2021 Lina K 07/07/2021

‘Ethnic extinction’ in northwest China

State policies in education are forcing Uyghur children to grow up in non-Muslim, Mandarin-speaking environments. Uyghur culture is being lost as a result.

Lina K 06/02/2021 Lina K 06/02/2021

The future of Uyghur cultural — and halal — life in the Year of the Pig

Up until 2018, Lunar New Year celebrations were conspicuously absent from Uyghur society. Today, it is the largest cultural event of the year — for the wrong reasons.

Lina K 06/01/2021 Lina K 06/01/2021

‘Only when you, your children, and your grandchildren become Chinese’: Life after Xinjiang detainment

“They said there was a document sent from above, from the administrative center, and that they were acting based on that document. They said no one can change the document since it was sent from the Central Committee. They said that the current system would not change until all Muslim nationalities would be extinct.”

Lina K 04/09/2019 Lina K 04/09/2019

How companies profit from forced labor in Xinjiang

Factories of Turkic Muslim internment, part of China’s reeducation camp system, are subsidized and directed by the state, and employ many former detainees at a fraction of minimum wage. Companies, both Chinese and foreign, are taking advantage.

Lina K 07/08/2019 Lina K 07/08/2019

Uyghur love in a time of interethnic marriage

Since 2018, there has been a notable rise in articles promoting marriage between Han men and Uyghur women. At a time when many people across China think of Uyghur men as potential terrorists and Uyghur women as potential fashion models, a new interethnic sexual politics is being institutionalized across Xinjiang.

Lina K 14/05/2019 Lina K 14/05/2019

‘Saved’ by state terror: Gendered violence and propaganda in Xinjiang

The ongoing atrocities targeting Turkic Muslim peoples in Xinjiang are, in many forms, gendered violence. As the “People’s War on Terror” campaign escalates, Han officials and settlers are removing Turkic Muslim men who they perceive as threats to “security” and “safety,” emptying out a clear path for Han settlers to insert their presence onto Uyghur and Kazakh homelands. This comes at the expense of the women who remain.

Lina K 05/12/2018 Lina K 05/12/2018

‘As if you’ve spent your whole life in prison’: Starving and subdued in Xinjiang detention centers

When Chinese state authorities prepared to release Gulbahar Jelil, an ethnic Uyghur woman born and raised in Kazakhstan, they told her that she was forbidden to tell anyone about what she had experienced over the one year, three months, and 10 days in which she was detained…

She didn’t listen.