• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • HOME
  • ABOUT CHINA
    • NEWS
    • TESTIMONIES
    • OP-EDS
    • FEATURED
    • GLOSSARY
    • CHINA PERSECUTION MAP
  • FROM THE WORLD
    • NEWS GLOBAL
    • TESTIMONIES GLOBAL
    • OP-EDS GLOBAL
    • FEATURED GLOBAL
  • INTERVIEWS
  • DOCUMENTS AND TRANSLATIONS
    • DOCUMENTS
    • THE TAI JI MEN CASE
    • TRANSLATIONS
    • EVENTS
  • ABOUT
  • EDITORIAL BOARD
  • TOPICS

Bitter Winter

A magazine on religious liberty and human rights

three friends of winter
Home / China / News China

Uyghurs Remember the Urumqi Massacre of 2009

07/09/2021Ruth Ingram |

A peaceful march became a bloodbath 12 years ago.

by Ruth Ingram

A montage of the disappeared from the Urumqi riots, assembled by the Uyghur Human Rights Project.
A montage of the disappeared from the Urumqi riots, assembled by the Uyghur Human Rights Project.

Peace turned to fury on the streets of Urumqi twelve years ago after protests over the killing of Uyghur factory workers in inner China fell on deaf ears. Later that evening merciless summary retaliatory justice was meted out by Chinese troops that mowed down hundreds of Uyghur civilians, as witnessed by Risalat, a Uyghur eyewitness, their bodies piled onto trucks and disappeared.

This week thousands of exiled Uyghurs gathered around the world to remember the dead and to pursue justice for their people, who are even now being herded into camps and sentenced extra-judicially to crippling prison terms. Their homeland groans under Orwellian surveillance and human rights abuses are de rigeur both inside and outside the camps.

Uyghurs in Munich protesting about the atrocities in their homeland.
Uyghurs in Munich protesting about the atrocities in their homeland.

The Uyghur diaspora is growing increasingly impatient and despondent over the fate of its people who languish in internment or forced labor, while Beijing’s denial of its crimes against humanity gathers supporters around the world, wooed by its economic and political clout, and paralyzed by fear of sanctions by the superpower.

More than 3,500 Uyghurs took to the streets in Istanbul and cities around Turkey to mourn the fate of their people, and demand the release of their compatriots in the homeland.
More than 3,500 Uyghurs took to the streets in Istanbul and cities around Turkey to mourn the fate of their people, and demand the release of their compatriots in the homeland.

Protesters and their supporters in France, Belgium, Japan, the UK, Kuwait, Turkey, Malaysia and Germany took to the streets of their capitals to demand the CCP free their compatriots and foreign governments take the fate of their people seriously by facing up to the monolith.

Uyghurs and supporters in Tokyo gathered to remember July 5, 2009.
Uyghurs and supporters in Tokyo gathered to remember July 5, 2009.
Uyghur protests in Paris.
Uyghur protests in Paris.

Rahima Mahmut, director of the World Uyghur Congress in London, addressed the closed windows and drawn curtains of the Chinese Embassy across the road. She pleaded for answers to the whereabouts of the disappeared from the riots in 2009, and for answers to questions every Uyghur has today about the fate of their loved ones in the homeland. She quoted Patigul Ghulam, the mother of a boy who was taken away in 2009, who had called Radio Free Asia in 2014 with her story and begged for help on behalf of all the other mothers who had lost sons and daughters. She told the radio station that she was just one of the many mothers who were still searching for their children.

Rahima Mahmut protesting at the Chinese Embassy in London
Rahima Mahmut protesting at the Chinese Embassy in London

That telephone call was the last time the outside world would ever hear from Patigul again. “Later she was detained and completely silenced,” said Rahima. “The painful reality is that the violent repression is far from a memory,” she said. “We could not have imagined the lengths the Chinese Communist Party would go to destroy our community and erase our culture,” she said, highlighting the powerful effect of the events of July 5, 2009, which were to signal the “turning point” in CCP persecution and where enforced disappearances would point to an incremental genocide of her people.

Jews and Uyghurs united in protest. Right, Sheldon Stone, a prominent Jewish advocate for Uyghur rights at the London event.
Jews and Uyghurs united in protest. Right, Sheldon Stone, a prominent Jewish advocate for Uyghur rights at the London event.

“My people cannot practice their culture without fear of retribution in their own country,” she said, citing the catalogue of human rights abuses being wreaked on the Turkic peoples of Xinjiang which is now so familiar to the world. She described the atrocities as the “worst kinds of crimes against humanity imaginable.” Highlighting the recent Amnesty International report, she concurred with its findings that her homeland has become a “dystopian hellscape” for “hundreds of thousands of Muslims, subject to mass internment and torture.”

Eziz Isa Elkun, Uyghur writer and poet at the London protest.
Aziz Isa Elkun, Uyghur writer and poet at the London protest.

She berated the international community for its indifference and silence after the extra-judicial arrests and killings following the July 2009 riots, which, she said should have been a “wake up call” to the world. “Instead, many averted their eyes,” she said. “The Chinese regime was not held accountable, Uyghurs continued to disappear and the victims never got the justice they deserved.” She continued, “the free world’s refusal to act gave the Chinese government the confidence to carry out the genocide my people are facing in broad daylight.”

She called on the global community, governments, politicians and corporations to avoid making the same mistakes again. “This has been the darkest twelve years in our collective history,” she said, adding that Uyghurs were not the only victims of Chinese Communism. Its 100-year record of crimes were committed not only against Turkic races but Mongolians, Tibetans, Hongkongers and any Han Chinese who dared to challenge the regime, she pointed out.

Uyghur exiled family turned out in force tin London to demand answers about the fate of their missing relatives at home.
Uyghur exiled family turned out in force tin London to demand answers about the fate of their missing relatives at home.
Uyghur exiled family turned out in force tin London to demand answers about the fate of their missing relatives at home.
Uyghur exiled family turned out in force tin London to demand answers about the fate of their missing relatives at home.

She saw a flicker of hope that the world was beginning to wake up to the injustices. “We are making powerful allies,” she concluded. “We are standing in solidarity with each other, and will fight to make our voices heard.”

Tagged With: Genocide, Muslim Uyghurs

bw-profile
Ruth Ingram

Ruth Ingram is a researcher who has written extensively for the Central Asia-Caucasus publication, Institute of War and Peace Reporting, the Guardian Weekly newspaper, The Diplomat, and other publications.

Related articles

  • Uyghurs Protest Xi’s Visit to Xinjiang

    Uyghurs Protest Xi’s Visit to Xinjiang

  • All Starts at School: Dr. Gyal Lo Denounces the CCP Genocidal Policy in Tibet

    All Starts at School: Dr. Gyal Lo Denounces the CCP Genocidal Policy in Tibet

  • “Waiting to Be Arrested at Night”: Tahir Hamut Izgil’s New Book is a Testament to Uyghur Indomitable Spirit

    “Waiting to Be Arrested at Night”: Tahir Hamut Izgil’s New Book is a Testament to Uyghur Indomitable Spirit

  • Harry van Bommel: “There is Enough Evidence, in 1971 in Bangladesh There Was a Genocide”

    Harry van Bommel: “There is Enough Evidence, in 1971 in Bangladesh There Was a Genocide”

Keep Reading

  • A Leaked Indictment: Heavy Punishments for Uyghurs Who Tell the Truth on the Web
    A Leaked Indictment: Heavy Punishments for Uyghurs Who Tell the Truth on the Web

    23-year-old Mirap Muhammet used a VPN to access Twitter. He was accused of “transferring intelligence abroad,” a very serious crime.

  • “What Is a Uyghur?” Western Politicians Ignore the Uyghur Issue at Their Own Peril
    “What Is a Uyghur?” Western Politicians Ignore the Uyghur Issue at Their Own Peril

    A U.S. presidential candidate confessed he does not know who the Uyghurs are. But understanding the Uyghur issue is essential to understanding China.

  • The 1971 Genocide in Bangladesh: Still Unacknowledged, Says a New Documentary
    The 1971 Genocide in Bangladesh: Still Unacknowledged, Says a New Documentary

    3,000,000 people killed, 400,000 women raped, tens of thousands abducted, 43,000 who were girls at the time still missing. Global Human Rights Defence’s movie calls for justice.

  • The Hague Human Rights Film Festival: Movies Vindicate Persecuted Women
    The Hague Human Rights Film Festival: Movies Vindicate Persecuted Women

    The second annual Global Human Rights Defence’s Human Rights Film Festival in The Hague presented the sufferings of Tajik, Yazidi, Ahmadi, Pakistani, Uyghur, and other women.

Primary Sidebar

Follow us

Newsletter

MOST READ

  • Crimes Against Humanity in Xinjiang Denounced at the United Nations—Again by Ruth Ingram
  • The Two Sides of Elon Musk: A Uyghur View by Kok Bayraq
  • France: Rémi Mogenet, a Victim of Anti-Cultism, Testifies by Massimo Introvigne
  • All Roads Lead to Rome: Two “Official” Chinese Bishops Will Attend the Catholic Synod by Massimo Introvigne
  • Anti-Religious Social Credit Targets Southern Mongolian Peasants by Zeng Liqin
  • Libertad de religión o creencia: Preocupación por las acusaciones infundadas de trata de personas en Argentina – Una carta a las autoridades argentinas by Bitter Winter
  • Why the Unification Church Should Not Be Dissolved. 4. The Witch Hunt Should Be Stopped by Tatsuki Nakayama

CHINA PERSECUTION MAP -SEARCH NEWS BY REGION

clickable geographical map of china, with regions

Copyright © 2023 · Bitter Winter · PRIVACY POLICY· COOKIE POLICY