Here's a summary of Uyghur-related news from around the world this week.
Xinjiang Uyghurs face food, medicine shortages due to COVID-19 lockdowns
The shortage of crucial supplies means some residents of China’s far-western Xinjiang region are depending on low-nutrient staples such as instant noodles amid tightening COVID-19 restrictions, which have left some parents quarantined in factories, unable to return home to check on their children. Members of a largely ethnic Uyghur diaspora community in Australia have staged public protests about the shortages, demanding action.
Lockdown-related deaths by starvation, untreated illness reported in Xinjiang
Local authorities and residents say as many as 12 people have died in the Xinjiang region town of Yining because of food shortages and inadequate medical care during strict COVID-19 lockdowns that began in early August, according to Radio Free Asia. The VOA sister outlet is also reporting that hundreds of ethnic Uyghurs were detained in Yining following street protests over the shortages and subsequent deaths.
Uyghur novel published seven years after it was translated
Uyghur novelist Perhat Tursun went missing in 2018. It was later confirmed the Xinjiang-based author of The Backstreets had been sentenced to 15 years in prison on dubious charges. After holding on to the manuscript for years, co-translator and anthropologist Darren Byler has seen to its publication.
News in brief
Rights groups are urging the European Union to amend proposed legislation that would ban products linked to forced labor globally. Some Uyghur rights groups raised concerns that the proposal is not regionally specific enough and are pushing for language targeting specific nations, such as China, which Western countries accuse of profiting from the forced labor of predominantly Muslim ethnic Uyghurs. China has repeatedly denied these allegations, calling them lies and disinformation.
Quote of note
“Their imprisonment is a further example of the fact that the Chinese government’s targeting of Uyghurs has nothing to do with individual beliefs, ideologies and actions. … Perhat’s crime was being born a Uyghur.”
— Joshua Freeman, English translator for several of Perhat Tursun’s poems
