Istanbul: Around 1,000 people protest over Uighur crackdown by China

Hundreds of people marched in Istanbul against China’s alleged brutal crackdown on Uighur Muslims, an ethnic minority in Xinjiang province. Protesters reportedly chanted “Murderer China, get out of East Turkestan” and held placards that read ‘stop the cruelty’.

The protesters also displayed solidarity with Arsenal midfielder Mesut Ozil, a German Muslim of Turkish origin, who had criticised China and lack of response from Muslims. Chinese foreign ministry dismissed the criticism saying he has been deceived by “fake news”. Ozil faced backlash from Chinese football fans, not happy with his public display of support towards Uighurs, which led to the removal of the soccer player from three existing titles in the country.

Many Muslim-majority nations and their leader have not openly criticised China’s crackdown on Uighurs barring Turkey, which termed it as ‘a great shame for humanity.’ In November, a dozen United Nations experts highlighted the issues around China’s counterterrorism law which have been used to gross violations of basic rights and freedoms in Xinjiang.

Read: China Pulls Arsenal Game Coverage After Mesut Özil's Criticism On Uighur

Use of Artificial Intelligence

According to the classified documents leaked to International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), China has deployed Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP) to collect personal information on citizens and created a lengthy list of “suspicious” people based on this data. The leaked classified documents, known as China Cables, described the detention camps holding over a million Uighur Muslims. The documents contained ‘telegram’, basically the operations manual with guidelines to manage the camps. There were ‘Bulletins’ to provide guidance on how to use IJOP and distributed to police and local party officials in charge of security around the region.

Read: Publicity Gives Us Protection,’ Says Uighur Whistleblower On Revealing Her Identity

Earlier, another leak of internal documents had revealed the directives of President Xi Jinping to “show absolutely no mercy” on Uighur Muslims, in the “struggle against terrorism, infiltration and separatism”. The 403-page long documents, leaked to an American daily, include internal speeches by Jinping and other officials, directives and reports on the surveillance and control of the Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang. After Uighur militants stabbed more than 150 people at a train station in 2014, Jinping, in a series of speeches delivered to officials, urged the party to follow America’s policy of “war on terror”.

Read: China Slams US Sanction On Uighur Muslims, Calls Politicians 'ignorant And Hypocritical'

Read: TikTok Owner, Huawei Helping China's Crackdown On Uighur Muslims: Report

(With inputs from agencies)