Radio Free Asia’s point-man for coverage of Xinjiang

   “The Chinese government, after arresting Uighur government officials, Uighur rich people, they’ve begun to arrest Uighur intellectuals,” Tahir Imin, a former student of Professor Dawut, said from Washington where he lives.  “Right now I can tell you more than 20 names, all prominent Uighur intellectuals.”  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/world/asia/china-xinjiang-rahile-dawut.html

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  On June 10, 2014, Tudaxun was sentenced to five years in a labor camp, China’s gulag, for “endangering state security.”  Per Radio Free Asia,* the evidence against Tudaxun consisted of claims he promoted Hijrat, the traditional pilgrimage from Mecca to Medina, and opted to pray at home instead of going to a mosque.  But the stated evidence was little more than a smokescreen.  Everyone familiar with the case—from Shohret and his co-workers to American officials and press freedom activists—says that Chinese authorities were simply looking to punish Shohret for his reporting on China’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang.  With the sentence the Chinese government broke new ground in its strategy of state-backed repression.  As far as anyone can tell, China became the first government to persecute a family member of   an American journalist in retaliation for his reporting.

  While reporters with dual citizenship have sometimes been targeted this is the first time Beijing has attempted such a move against the family of a reporter with sole U.S. citizenship.  “I’m not aware of any other cases in which the [Chinese] government has arrested the family of an American reporter,” says Maya Wang, a China specialist at Human Rights Watch.  Added Bob Dietz, Asia program coordinator at Committee to Protect Journalists, “No one can recall another case like this in China. … The lengths they’re going to is an indicator of just how seriously they view the threat” in Xinjiang.

   The Chinese government’s frustration with Shohret’s work wasn’t a surprise.  For years, Shohret has served as Radio Free Asia’s point man for coverage of Xinjiang--East Turkestan, as the local Uighur population calls it.  http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/foreigners/2015/07/shohret_hoshur_s_brothers_are_being_disappeared_by_the_chinese_government.html
* *Radio Free Asia, hq Washington, D.C. is a private, non-profit that broadcasts in 9 east Asian languages, incl. Tibetan.

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