Australians ‘trapped’ in China’s Uighur crackdown

At least 20 Australian citizens or permanent residents are reportedly trapped in China’s Xinjiang province.

Blindfolded and shackled Uighurs in China’s Xinjiang Province. Picture: YouTube

An Australian Uighur community leader says he knows of at least 20 Australian citizens or permanent residents trapped in China’s Xinjiang province, amid a Chinese government crackdown on Muslim minorities.

Confidential documents, leaked to a consortium of international journalists, have detailed the Chinese government’s deliberate strategy to lock up Muslim ­minorities, and rewire their thoughts and their language.

The documents stipulate watch towers, double-locked doors and blanket video surveillance “to prevent escapes”.

The leaked cache of documents reveals authorities have highlighted 23 Australian citizens in surveillance sweeps because of their passports, the ABC has reported.

The documents reveal public sec­urity officials are told that “suspected terrorism cannot be ruled out”, even for foreign passport-holders.

Nurmuhammad Majid, the East Turkistan Australian Association president, said he had information about more than 20 Australian ­citizens, or Australian permanent residents, trapped in the East Turkistan region of China.

“I believe all of them are currently experiencing difficulties in either leaving China or getting legal assistance,’’ he said.

He had no information that Australian citizens were detained, but believed some of the permanent residents were under house arrest.

Mr Majid said at least half of Australia’s 3000-strong Uighur community had reported relatives missing or in detention since 2017.

He said detentions of Muslim minorities in Xinjiang were ­accelerating, while China “has not released a single person”.

The so-called China Cables leak reveal camps for Muslim ­minorities in China’s far west are secret centres for forced ideological and behavioural re-education.

They describe an elaborate scoring system that grades detainees on how well they speak the dominant Mandarin language, memorise ideology and adhere to strict rules on everything down to bathing and using the toilet.

They also show how Beijing is pioneering a new form of social control using data and artificial ­intelligence.

With the help of mass surveillance technology, computers issued the names of tens of thousands of people for interrogation or detention in just one week, including university students and party officials.

Taken as a whole, the documents give the most significant description yet of how the mass ­detention camps work in the words of the ­Chinese government itself.

Experts say they spell out a vast system that targets, tracks and grades entire ethnicities to forcibly assimilate them — especially ­Uighurs, a Turkic minority of about 10 million with its own language and culture.

“They confirm that this is a form of cultural genocide,” said Adrian Zenz, a German security expert on Xinjiang.

“It really shows that from the onset, the ­Chinese government had a plan.”

He said the documents echo the aim of the camps as outlined in a 2017 report from a local branch of the Xinjiang Ministry of Justice: to “wash brains, cleanse hearts, support the right, remove the wrong”.

Additional reporting: AP