Cina Camp Survivor Describes Life Under House Arrest in Xinjiang

No Escape: Camp Survivor Describes Life Under House Arrest in Xinjiang

What Happened: Zhanargul Zhumatai, a Kazakh artist and former editor, was one of the hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic ethnic people sent to detention camps in Xinjiang in 2017. Zhumatai was detained for the “crime” of visiting Kazakhstan and having the apps for Instagram and Facebook on her phone. She was released two years later – but freedom remained a distant dream. Chinese authorities claim that everyone has been released from what they call “vocational training centers” (and what survivors say are internment camps). But many of the released, like Zhumatai, find their lives shattered forever.

Our Focus: Zhumatai couldn’t find work because of her detention; she couldn’t even travel within Urumqi, her hometown, without setting off alarms at the numerous facial recognition checkpoints around the city. Desperate, she shared her plight with international activists – a very rare act, as most who speak on the record about their persecution only do so after having escaped abroad. Now Zhumatai reports that the Chinese authorities are threatening her family and are determined to involuntarily admit her to a psychiatric hospital. “They [the Urumqi police] asked me why I published government secrets but I said, ‘These are not government secrets. This is what I am experiencing. I am speaking the truth,’ ” Zhumatai told The Diplomat. “I am an innocent person; I have not committed any crime. I don’t know what will happen to my life… I live in utter fear.”

What Comes Next: Zhumatai said she took the step of contacting foreigners with her story because “I have a wish that all the whole world knows about my case – not only for me but for all the Kazakh nomadic people who have suffered.” Feeling she has exhausted her options for a life in Xinjiang, she wants to move to Kazakhstan, but fears arrest is not far away. “Should something happen to me,” she said, “the world must do more to raise awareness and hold the authorities to account.”