China's re-education camps have been known for several months. Three million Uyghurs are or were imprisoned in Xinjiang. Dolkun Isa finally wants to see sanctions
The World Uyghur Congress (WUC) has been advocating for the Uyghur people since 2004. The exile organization in Munich is classified as "separatist" by China's government. The 53-year-old Dolkun Isa is its president since 2017.
STANDARD: How has the work of the WUC changed in recent years?
Isa: In general, not much has changed - except for the attention that the issue receives today. We have been pointing out the massive human rights violations in East Turkistan (Xinjiang, Uyghur Autonomous Region of the PRC, note) for years. With Xi Jinping coming to power, these human rights violations escalated into genocide. In 2015, Muslims were banned from fasting during Ramadan. Shortly thereafter, all Uyghurs had their passports revoked. International flights from Ürümqi have not existed since 2016. Muslim first names were banned. Qurans and prayer rugs are confiscated. Every time this kind of thing took place, we pointed it out, but usually nothing much really changed. read more