Press Release
Uyghurs Are Also Part of the Best Nation, Do Not Forget Them
(Translated)

As we approach the 104th anniversary of the destruction of the Khilafah (Caliphate), the Muslim Ummah continues to receive news of oppression from its enemies everywhere, from Palestine to Syria, Sudan, Egypt, and China, where the Uyghur Muslims endure persecution and severe restrictions in every aspect of their lives.

Despite China's systematic media blackout on its atrocities in East Turkestan, some news of the Uyghurs’ suffering still reaches us. These reports reinforce our certainty, day after day, of the urgent need for a Khilafah that will restore the Muslims' dignity and protect them from all forms of aggression.

On the 20th of this month, the BBC published a report titled “'Hell on earth': China deportation looms for Uyghurs held in Thailand” The report identifies 47 Uyghur Muslim men detained by Thailand in 2014 after fleeing persecution in their homeland. One of the escapees, a Muslim woman living in Turkey since 2015, was allowed to leave Thailand with her three children but without her husband. Now, she fears that if he is deported to China, she will never see him again.

It is worth noting that in 2015, Thailand forcibly deported a group of Uyghur refugees back to China. They were filmed hooded, shackled, and surrounded by a large number of Chinese police officers. Their fate remains unknown, with reports indicating that they faced secret trials and long prison sentences.

Long-term imprisonment is one of China's methods of suppressing Muslims, fabricating charges such as "reading or teaching the Quran" and "learning Islamic rulings." Uyghur Muslims are deprived of their rights in China, and Muslim women receive no protection from so-called feminist organizations or conventions like CEDAW. In June last year, China arrested Selihan Rozi, a 49-year-old Muslim woman, for teaching Quranic verses to her children and neighbors for prayer. She was sentenced to seventeen years in prison! A local Communist Party official told Radio Free Asia that she was imprisoned for "illegal religious activities."

Women in China are imprisoned for many years simply for reciting verses from the Quran, despite it being a natural human right enshrined in international laws, laws that seem to be enforced only when targeting Islam and Muslims. Meanwhile, Muslim men are arrested and forcibly deported back to the very hell they once fled, all in full view of the world, yet no one objects to this blatant violation of their fundamental right to practice their religion freely.

At the same time, we have seen how Western governments were quick to mobilize in defense of small ethnic groups in Syria when the mujahideen managed to overthrow a regime that had tormented its people for decades.

It has become evident to anyone with eyes to see that the international onslaught against Muslims is at its peak, and that slogans of human rights and minority rights are nothing but idols they worship when it serves their interests, only to trample them underfoot when those same rights go against their agendas.

But what about us as Muslims? After witnessing their enmity, hypocrisy, and disregard for our rights and dignity, can any rational person still expect justice from them?

The Uyghur Muslims, like the rest of the Ummah, remain vulnerable in the absence of a state that defends them and a leader who protects them. The words "Ahad! Ahad!" that Bilal (may Allah be pleased with him) chanted did not shield him from the lashes of Umayyah ibn Khalaf, what freed him was the Second Pledge of Aqabah, the Takbirs of Badr, and the swords of the Mujahideen who carried the banner of Islam under the protection of a state.

The suffering endured by the Ummah and the crimes committed by the oppressors against it will ultimately pave the way for the establishment of Islam’s grand structure the Khilafah Rashidah (rightly guided Caliphate), a light guiding the oppressed and a fire consuming the tyrants, casting curses upon them until the Day of Judgment.

[وَيَقُولُونَ مَتَى هُوَ قُلْ عَسَى أَنْ يَكُونَ قَرِيباً] “and say, "When is that?" Say, "Perhaps it will be soon” [Surat Al-Isra:51]

Women Section
in the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir