Uyghur Human Rights Project

05/29/2026

📖 New – A biweekly roundup of essential reporting and analysis on the Uyghur crisis, curated by UHRP staff.

Issue 24, May 14, 2026 – May 27, 2026

📸 Data Centers & Surveillance Tech: In a new report from C4ADS, Mishel Kondi warns that China's expanding data centers, a key part of the surveillance infrastructure targeting Uyghurs, rely on American and Taiwanese technology.

📝 Family Separation: In a moving letter published by Kashgar Times, Akida Pulat reflects on nine years of separation from her mother, imprisoned Uyghur scholar Rahile Dawut, marking her mother's birthday and highlighting her dedication to preserving Uyghur culture.

🇨🇳 "State Secret" Regulations: China's new security regulation in the Uyghur Region broadens the definition of "state secrets," further restricting access to information, warns Asiye Uyghur, writing for Global Voices.

📦 Forced Labor Import Bans: In a new policy brief, Laura Murphy and the Ryan-Carr Center for Human Rights outline how governments can strengthen forced labor import bans through mechanisms including rebuttable presumptions and greater international coordination.

🏭Forced Labor Transfers: The transfer of Uyghur laborers to factories across China has increased since the end of China’s zero-COVID policies, raising concerns over forced labor in global supply chains, warns Adrian Zenz, as reported by Simon Ferrigno for Ecotextile News.

🔎Read the full Uyghur Reader:

Issue 24: May 14, 2026 – May 27, 2026 Welcome to the twenty-fourth issue of the Uyghur Reader, a biweekly content roundup curated by the staff of the Uyghur Human Rights Project. Each issue features carefully selected articles, reports, and publications from media outlets, academic institutions, N...

05/29/2026

Family separation is not a side effect of the Chinese government's abuses against Uyghurs – it is a deliberate tool of transnational repression used to silence Uyghurs far beyond China's borders.

Yesterday, UHRP and International Republican Institute (IRI) hosted a discussion on a recent UHRP report, Fading Ties: Uyghur Family Separation as a Tool of Transnational Repression.

Thank you to report author Henryk Szadziewski for presenting key report findings, Mihrigul Tursun for sharing her powerful testimony, and all who joined us to highlight this urgent issue.

Read the full report to learn more: https://uhrp.org/report/fading-ties-uyghur-family-separation-as-a-tool-of-transnational-repression/

05/20/2026

Please join International Republican Institute (IRI) and Uyghur Human Rights Project for a discussion on UHRP's recent report, Fading Ties: Uyghur Family Separation as a Tool of Transnational Repression.

📅 Thursday, May 28, 2026
🕒 3:00 PM ET
📍1225 I (Eye) Street NW, Suite 800, Washington, DC 20005

The conversation will feature report author Henryk Szadziewski, who will share additional insights and analysis from his research, followed by a discussion on the broader implications of transnational repression and its impact on Uyghur families worldwide. Light snacks and beverages will be provided.

🔗 RSVP: https://forms.gle/Srg4n1rPHYnQyJPy8

05/20/2026

Today is renowned Uyghur scholar Dr. Rahile Dawut's 60th birthday.

Instead of celebrating with her loved ones, she is spending this milestone behind bars, serving a life sentence in a Chinese prison.

Dr. Rahile Dawut is highly respected internationally for her scholarship documenting Uyghur folklore and traditions. Her research is not a crime. Documenting Uyghur culture is not a crime.

China must release Rahile Dawut immediately and free all unjustly detained and imprisoned Uyghur scholars, intellectuals, writers, and cultural leaders.

The Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) is appalled to learn that Professor Rahile Dawut, a highly respected Uyghur anthropologist, was handed a life sentence by the Chinese authorities in 2018.

05/15/2026

📖 New – A biweekly roundup of essential reporting and analysis on the Uyghur crisis, curated by UHRP staff.

Issue 23, April 30 – May 13, 2026

🗣️Activists Warn US Attention Fading: Amid the Trump-Xi summit, Uyghur activists warn the Trump administration has largely stopped publicly addressing China's persecution of Uyghurs. Amy Qin reports for The New York Times that reduced attention to human rights and no new forced labor sanctions risk weakening international pressure on China.

🇬🇧 Limited Policy Action in UK: Five years after the UK formally recognized the Uyghur genocide, concrete policy action remains lacking. Rahima Mahmut, writing for The Diplomat Magazine urges stronger import restrictions, mandatory human rights due diligence, and trade policy aligned with the ethical implications of that designation.

🇨🇭 Swiss Inaction on TNR: For swissinfo, Dorian Burkhalter reports that human rights organizations criticized the Swiss government for failing to adequately protect Uyghur and Tibetan communities from Chinese transnational repression, including surveillance, intimidation, and threats against family members in the Uyghur Region.

⚖️ Forced Labor Enforcement Gaps: David Lawder (Reuters) reports on USTR hearings into countries accused of failing to block imports made with forced labor. Activists warn imports ties to Uyghur forced labor, banned in the US by the UFLPA, still enter global markets via countries lacking sufficient enforcement mechanisms.

🇸🇪 Diaspora Resilience Under Pressure: In the journal Ethnic and Racial Studies, Michel Harb and Arne Wackenhut document how China’s transnational repression targets Uyghur activists in Sweden through surveillance, intimidation, and threats to family members—while many activists say these experiences have strengthened their commitment to speaking out.

🔎Read the full Uyghur Reader:

Issue 23: April 30, 2026 – May 13, 2026 Welcome to the twenty-third issue of the Uyghur Reader, a biweekly content roundup curated by the staff of the Uyghur Human Rights Project. Each issue features carefully selected articles, reports, and publications from media outlets, academic institutions, ...

05/11/2026

New Op-Ed by Omer Kanat:

Trump must put detained Uyghur intellectuals on the agenda for his upcoming meeting with Xi.

Across the Uyghur diaspora in the United States, families are living with the same cruel separation: their relatives, including many of the most respected Uyghur intellectuals of their generation, are imprisoned by the Chinese government.

If Trump sits across from Xi and fails to raise the cases of Uyghur Americans and their families, Beijing will read that omission not as pragmatism, but as weakness.

Read more in The Diplomat Magazine⬇️

If Trump sits across from Xi and fails to raise the cases of Uyghur Americans and their families, Beijing will read that omission not as pragmatism, but as weakness.

05/11/2026

A new report from United States Commission on International Religious Freedom further confirms what we've long warned: China is codifying and escalating its "sinicization of religion" policy – deepening restrictions on religious practice for Uyghur Muslims, Tibetan Buddhists, and all religious communities.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) under Xi Jinping’s rule has systematically intensified its restrictions of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) through a series of laws that it recently passed and promulgated, expanding its coercive “sinicization of religion” policy. This issue update highli...

05/05/2026

Today is Doppa Day, a celebration of Uyghur culture, history, and identity.

As the CCP continues its campaign of forced assimilation seeking to erase Uyghur culture, the doppa is a powerful symbol of resilience.

Read Rafael Kokbore’s moving reflection, "My Father’s Doppa: In Honor of Uyghur Doppa Day," first published for UHRP Insights last year:
https://uhrp.org/insights/my-fathers-doppa-in-honor-of-uyghur-doppa-day-may-5/

05/01/2026

New UHRP 💡

“On World Press Freedom Day, it is worth being honest about who benefits from the comfort with the informational void that is the Uyghur Region and who continues to pay the price for it.”

As approaches, Henryk Szadziewski examines how China's repression of Uyghur-language media, harassment and imprisonment of journalists, and global propaganda efforts have created that void – and why the world must keep asking hard questions.

May 1, 2026 A UHRP Insights column by Dr. Henryk Szadziewski, Director of Research. World Press Freedom Day arrives this year against the backdrop of some challenging numbers. Reporters Without Borders ranks China 178th out of 180 countries on its 2025 Press Freedom Index, a lowly position it has oc...

04/30/2026

📖 New – A biweekly roundup of essential reporting and analysis on the Uyghur crisis, curated by UHRP staff.

Issue 22, covering April 16-29, 2026.

📡Targeted Digital TNR: A new report from The Citizen Lab and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) documents the Chinese government's digital transnational repression tactics against diaspora activists – weaponizing trusted communication channels to trick activists, surveil networks, and sow distrust within diaspora communities. (Rebekah Brown, Maia Scott, Marcus Michaelson, Emile Dirks, Francesca Thaler)

🧸 Forced Labor & Consumer Goods: Reporting in The New York Times found testing of popular Labubu dolls uncovered cotton sourced from the Uyghur Region, linking a major consumer brand to supply chains implicated in state-imposed forced labor and highlighting continued enforcement gaps under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. (Ana Claire Swanson, Sapna Maheshwari, Meagan Tobin)

🎓 Uyghur Youth Leadership Recognized: Cornell undergraduate Zilala Mamat is one of three recipients of this year’s Robinson-Appel Humanitarian Awards, honoring her advocacy for Uyghurs in exile and her work supporting diaspora youth through United Uyghur Youth and Rawan Mentorship. (Olivia Hall, for Cornell Chronicle)

⚠️ Repression Continues as Attention Fades: For ABC Australia, Human Rights Watch researcher Yalkun Uluyol warns that Uyghurs continue to face arbitrary detention, surveillance, and forced labor, despite global attention shifting as many governments sideline human rights concerns in favor of political and economic interests.

⛓️Repression Has Evolved, Not Ended: In Foreign Policy, Adrian Zenz highlights rare insider testimony from police officer Zhang Yabo, describing how authorities in the Uyghur Region have shifted from mass internment to more concealed and embedded systems of short-term detention, pervasive surveillance, coercive labor transfers, and ongoing cultural erasure.

🔎 Read the full Uyghur Reader:

Issue 22: April 16, 2026 – April 29, 2026  Welcome to the twenty-second issue of the Uyghur Reader, a biweekly content roundup curated by the staff of the Uyghur Human Rights Project. Each issue features carefully selected articles, reports, and publications from media outlets, academic instituti...