From “East Turkistan: A Genocide Buried in Silence — Witnesses. Evidence. A World That Turned Away”
by Mehmet Emin Hazret
I. A Witness of the Past: Habibzade Ahmed Kemal
East Turkistan is not only a witness of today’s tragedy—it has endured for over a century.
China’s systematic repression of the Uyghurs is not new; it is the product of a long-standing mindset embedded in the state’s memory.
In 1915, Ottoman intellectual Habibzade Ahmed Kemal witnessed and documented the horrors inside a Chinese prison in Ürümqi:
“Heated metal plates were pressed against their faces.
They were stripped naked and whipped with barbed wire…
Chains were locked around their necks and they were dragged through the streets like dogs.”
Ahmed Kemal’s attempt to open a modern school in Kashgar was denounced because he hung a world map in the classroom.
He was accused of “leading children away from religion.”
This showed that China’s target was not just the Uyghur body, but the Uyghur mind and knowledge.
His memoir, “China-Turkistan Recollections,” is more than personal memory—
It is documented testimony of a people whose dignity, education, and future were systematically targeted.
II. A Witness of the Present: Mihrigul Tursun
Exactly one century later, in the same city, a woman witnesses a similar nightmare.
In 2015, Mihrigul Tursun was arrested at the Ürümqi Airport—
She had her three infant triplets with her, just two months old.
After her arrest:
She never learned what happened to one of her babies
One of her ears was rendered deaf
She was subjected to electric torture
Deprived of sleep for four days
Her head was shaved, her privacy violated
Of the 9 women she shared a cell with, only 8 survived
“They handed me the corpse of one of my children.
I still don’t know how he died.”
III. From Torture to Exile
Mihrigul was taken to the camps three times.
Each time:
She carried the pain of a mother
And each time she returned, her children no longer recognized her
In 2018, she was released thanks to the intervention of the Egyptian Embassy.
But even that freedom came at a high price:
Her husband, who traveled from Egypt to China in search of their children,
was sentenced to 16 years in prison.
Mihrigul eventually sought asylum in the United States.
But the scars remain.
“I begged them to kill me.
It would have been better than living like that.”
— Mihrigul Tursun
IV. History Repeats, the Victims Change
Ahmed Kemal – 1915
Mihrigul Tursun – 2015
A hundred years passed.
The methods remained the same.
Only the witnesses changed.
Still Ürümqi
Still iron bars
Still repression in the name of “education”
Still an assault on Uyghur identity
The memory of East Turkistan lives on—
In a woman’s tears,
In a mother’s missing child,
In a teacher’s banned map.
The same pain, unchanged for a century:
Repression that began with a map in a classroom,
And ended with the trauma of a mother holding her child’s corpse.
This cycle remains unbroken—like a chain that refuses to snap.
V. Behind the Testimony Lies the Truth
Mihrigul Tursun’s testimony is living, undeniable proof of China’s ongoing systematic persecution of the Uyghur people in the 21st century.
This time, the repression is not just enforced with batons—
It is carried out through:
Digital surveillance
“Re-education” camps
Secret prisons closed off from the outside world
Yet at its core, nothing has changed:
The same pain.
The same methods.
The same denial.
VI. A Century of Continuity: State Policy
There are exactly 100 years between Ahmed Kemal’s accounts and Mihrigul Tursun’s experience.
And yet, the content of what they endured is almost identical.
This reveals a chilling truth:
The repression of Uyghurs is not a sporadic policy—
It is a consistent state strategy maintained over time.
Worship is banned
Mosques are demolished
Traditional clothing is criminalized
Birth rates are forcibly suppressed
These are not temporary policies—
They are the permanent tools of China’s strategy to assimilate, suppress, and, when necessary, eliminate.
VII. The Crime of Silence: The World’s Test
This oppression continues not only because of Beijing’s policies—
But also because of the silence of the world.
As long as the international community values economic and political interests
more than the suffering of an entire people,
this tragedy will not end.
And this silence is more than shame—
It is complicity.
When a people’s language, religion, fertility, and memory are attacked—
This is not a “domestic issue.”
It is a crime against humanity.
What is happening today in East Turkistan
will go down in history as the genocide of the 21st century.
Conclusion: This Will Neither Be Forgotten Nor Forgiven
What is happening in East Turkistan is not a tragedy of the past.
It is a wound that continues to bleed—now, today, every single day.
From Habibzade Ahmed Kemal’s century-old recollections
to Mihrigul Tursun’s agonizing testimony,
this unbroken chain reveals the unchanged mindset and
systemic violence of Chinese policy toward ethnic minorities.
This book is not just a narrative—
It is a memory, a document, a record of humanity.
Because:
To forget oppression—
Is to forgive it.
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