In a Dutch refugee camp, Kalbinur shares a room with others and struggles to find a quiet space to speak, but eventually manages it. In her early 50s, she is a teacher whose medical problems stem from her being mistreated as a Uyghur Muslim from China\u2019s Xinjiang province. She is now trying to tell the world what is going on there.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cInitially I had an IUD [intrauterine device, or coil], then they performed a forced sterilisation on me. I bled profusely for weeks,\u201d she says through her translator. Believe it or not, she is one of the lucky ones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sitting on the end of a bed, she speaks with a softness about what she saw when she was told to teach at one of China\u2019s \u201cre-education camps\u201d Get The Jewish News Daily Edition by email and never miss our top stories<\/a>FREE SIGN UP<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Officially denied by China until satellite imagery made it embarrassing, up to two million Uyghurs are believed to have passed through, died in, or remain inmates of these gigantic desert campuses, where their only \u2018crime\u2019 is to be Muslim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After spending nine months getting 23 different admin permissions, Kalbinur finally flew to Holland on a one-month visa late last year, to see her biologist daughter who works in a laboratory there. On arrival, she applied for asylum. Her husband is still in Xinjiang, and this is where her voice breaks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Read more:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAfter a few weeks, he started pressing me to return. I said I was getting medical attention, but the pressure became more severe. On 20 February, he called me from the police station. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe words he used, I cannot even tell you, but basically it was \u2018you betrayed our country, our connection is cut, I\u2019m divorcing you.\u2019 This was three months after I flew to Europe. He would not do that if he had not been forced to. He had been summoned. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI have had messages from friends, neighbours, local police, all saying \u201cIn October, they took my brothers and sisters and interrogated them for Why are the authorities so worried? Because Kalbinur is one of the very few eyewitnesses to this \u201cre-education\u201d who can reveal what they saw. First ushered in to teach Uyghur detainees Chinese in 2017, she describes how the horror unfolded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOn CCTV screens, I saw 10 cells, each holding 10 people. There were no beds, just blankets on the floor. Many were very elderly. They entered the classroom with chains around their hands and feet. Some were crying, all kept their heads down. I said \u2018Salam alaikum.<\/em>\u2019 No one answered. Then I realised I had said something forbidden.\u201d At lunch, she learned that the inmates\u2019 rice soup contained no rice, and that their tea was not boiling. Over six months, she got to know her students, whose names were replaced with numbers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOne was very handsome, very smart, he had been rich before his estate was frozen by the authorities. Every day, he asked me to give him a few more minutes to see the light of the sun, as there was a 20cm gap One by one, they stopped coming. \u201cEvery day, my students got fewer. They entered in good health, but withered away. Some could not even walk by the end. I saw intellectuals, businessmen and students whose only crime was to consult Facebook. \u201cThe door they passed through was chained, which forced them to crawl on all fours. I met their gaze, it was excruciating. They could only use the bathroom three times a day and have one 15-minute shower per month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOutside the camps, even the neighbourhood became a prison. I saw police arrest boys on the street just for talking. One of my neighbours asked his Chinese business partner to call his son in Kyrgyzstan to beg him not to come home. That night, five policemen came to his house and took him away. His Chinese partner was also arrested.\u201d Of her local community of 600, 190 disappeared between 2017 and 2019, and Chinese internal immigrants were quickly moved into the empty apartments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Inside the camps, she said things were getting worse. \u201cAfter six months, there were about 50 per cell. They had to sleep side down. The room of torture was in the basement.The screams were spreading all over the building. I could hear them when I had lunch, sometimes in class. A policeman told me there are four kinds of electric shock torture: the chair, the glove, the helmet and anal rape with a stick.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A policeman told me there are four kinds of electric shock torture: the chair, the glove, the helmet and anal rape with a stick.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Given that the Holocaust happened partly because the Nazis successfully portrayed Jews as sub-human, are the Chinese doing something similar? <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI used to watch films about how Nazis treated Jews and I would cry, feeling the pain of those innocent people. I never thought one day it would be us. I am a witness from two camps, one male, one female. I have seen and heard things beyond the imagination or acceptance of normal \u201cThey are torturing and raping Uyghur men and women. For women, it is gang rape and sterilisation. For men, they use the electric baton. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI have seen men shackled, hardly able to walk, unable to sit in class from The Uyghur Muslims in China\u2019s Xinjiang province are being tortured \u2013 and those who manage to flee are still not safe https:\/\/jewishnews.timesofisrael.com\/a-uyghur-refugees-harrowing-testimony-i-saw-heard-things-beyond-imagination\/?fbclid=IwAR0tEFfPEDmkCByvNteBb54azUxp2r9dorjZXrfQidF5ynK5cu2SQzw3gQo In a Dutch … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2003,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,4],"class_list":["post-2002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-ethnic-cleansing-crime-against-humanity-genocide","tag-human-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2002"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2002\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2004,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2002\/revisions\/2004"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
in 2017. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I should come back. I am harassed constantly.\u201d It is ongoing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
10 days. They were released on the condition they persuade me to return. On a video call, my elder sister said I was \u2018exaggerating\u2019, asking \u2018what did your government do to you for you to betray them?\u2019 She said I must come home.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/static.timesofisrael.com\/jewishndev\/uploads\/2020\/10\/PA-55083050.jpg\")
A man and his child holding a placard against China during the demonstration.
(Photo by Ana Fernandez \/ SOPA Images\/Sipa USA)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
in my class window. One day he disappeared. I was later told he died of a brain haemorrhage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/static.timesofisrael.com\/jewishndev\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Rahima3.jpg\")
Kalbinur Sidiq taught at the \u2018re-education\u2019 camps in Xinjiang, China<\/p>\n\n\n\n
human beings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
the pain. It is difficult for me to describe. It is horrific. It is too much.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"