A testimony from our “100 Camp Testimonies” Book
I would like to testify for my brother Abduweli Abdurishit, who is held in an internment camp and subjected to forced labor.
My brother was detained on July 12, 2015. I got a message from my sister saying that our brother had been taken to the police station, and that she did not have more information about his situation. I tried to contact my former colleagues and friends to find out where my brother was held and the reason for his detention, but I did not get any answer. One week after my brother’s detention, my sister said, “Brother, please don’t try to do anything, and everything is fine. Our brother will be away for a while.” I did not listen to my sister, and I kept reaching out to different people. After a month I learned that my brother was given a 10-year sentence.
I did not know the reason for my brother’s incarceration until 2016. My brother and his friends frequently gathered together between 2012 and 2014. They stopped their social gatherings after learning about the order passed down from the Chinese authorities, i.e., social gatherings would no longer be tolerated, regardless of their nature. In 2015, the authorities called upon the public to come clean about their “wrongdoings” in the past, stating that, “Those who admit and confess to their wrongdoings will not be punished, while those who choose to hide their past wrongdoings will be punished harshly if the government finds out about them.”
One of my brother’s friends went to the police told them about their social gatherings that took place between 2012 and 2014; as a result, the police detained everyone that took part in the gatherings, including my brother. I heard that some people had been sentenced to four to 17 years in prison only because they had a party (social gathering) at home, or they practiced Islam and prayed at home.
Although the Chinese regime is an authoritarian regime, Han Chinese population can practice ancestor worshiping, and they are free to have social gatherings. Alas, my brother has already been incarcerated for more than six years.
Sometime in 2016 my sister left me a message, “Our brother sent his regards to you, and he would like to see you.” “That’s great, and I will visit him. Ask the police whether I am allowed to visit him,” I replied. The police told my sister that I was welcome to visit my brother, but with one condition: I should give a speech to the Uyghur inmates. The content of the brainwashing speech sounded as follows: I was not religious and I did not take part in any religious activity; I studied communism very well, so I was selected by the Chinese government to study abroad, and now I have a good life; You should study communism not Islam, and you are in prison because you have studied Islam.
The police wanted to use me as “a model Uyghur” to brainwash the Uyghur inmates, and I told my sister, “I will not visit my brother.” I later received a four-page letter from my brother, telling me about his daily routines in prison. After his morning exercise, he attends his political indoctrination class. He also studies Mandarin Chinese and works at a factory. After returning from the factory, he takes a shower, and then he can watch any movie he wants and eat anything he wants. He says he eats a lot of meat and vegetables, likening his prison conditions to an all-inclusive five-star hotel.
It was obvious that my brother was told what to write, in the hope of fooling me. When my sister asked my brother what he was doing in prison, he said it was mostly political studies. He also said that he was working in a factory that manufactured cell phone chargers, so whenever I charge my cell phone, I cannot help but think that my Samsung charger was probably produced by my brother. Various news outs have reported about the Uyghur forced labor in Chinese factories regarding the products of well-known international brands like Apple, Samsung, and Nike.