Nuria Zaiden, an Irish national and member of a small Irish Uyghur community who has lived in Ireland for the past decade and a half, has been afraid to speak publicly about the Chinese government's campaign of repression in Xinjiang. Ta.
“I came to Ireland and still lived in fear. I could never say what I was really going through and what was happening to me.” she says.
Zyden co-founded the Irish Uyghur Cultural Association with David O'Brien, an Irish academic specializing in Chinese ethnic identity. We will focus on Uyghur culture and language, but also aim to raise awareness about what is happening to the Uyghur people in China.
The new association was launched on Friday at a celebration of Uyghur culture in a restaurant in Dublin, with many community members in attendance wearing traditional costumes.
The event featured Uyghur music and poetry, as well as food and cake brought by participants.
At the launch ceremony were Dolkun Aissa, president of the World Uyghur Congress, Rushan Abbas, executive director of the U.S.-based Uyghur Campaign, her husband Abdulhakin Idris, executive director of the U.S. Uyghur Research Center, and members of Taiwan. Pierre Yang and others were also included. Oliver Sears, Director of Holocaust Awareness Ireland, representatives of the Irish Muslim community, Irish supporters of the Uyghur movement, and representatives of the US Embassy.
Speaking ahead of the announcement, Seiden said that since his late teens he had admired the European tradition of free speech, which does not exist in China.
When she came to live in Ireland and became an Irish citizen, she was still afraid to voice her opinion about the oppression of the Uighur community in China by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR). I realized that I was. That could constitute a crime against humanity, she said.
“Recently I thought to myself that life is short and we must protect our true values. If I believe that what they are doing is wrong, it is still hypocritical. “You shouldn't just turn around and say everything's okay,” she said.
She strongly believes that it is “unfair” to continue to feel controlled by Beijing's regime while living in a country where freedom of speech is recognized, even if what you say carries the risk of repercussions. I feel it.
“We cannot be so selfish, thinking only of our own safety. There is a need. If I'm still silent and let their system control me, I feel like it's not worth it. I don't stand for what I believe in.”
Although the current situation for the mostly Muslim Uyghur people in China's Xinjiang region is dire, “in our history, we had charm, we had traditions, we had beautiful music, art, and the Silk Road. It is important to preserve that culture. All cultures deserve to be celebrated and passed down from generation to generation.”
In a speech at Dublin City University on Thursday, Abbas said the campaign against Uyghurs and other Turkic ethnic groups in Xinjiang includes concentration camps, cutting-edge surveillance technology, forced sterilization and abortion, mass rape, He said it included organ harvesting, child abduction and modern crimes. Slavery.
Xinjiang, translated as the New Territories, was incorporated into the People's Republic of China in 1949. Many Turkic residents of this region prefer to call it East Turkestan. The Han Chinese, China's majority ethnic group, accounted for 7 percent of Xinjiang's population in the early 1950s, but now account for 42 percent of the country's 26 million people.
The Chinese embassy in Dublin said in a statement last year that Xinjiang authorities were taking “resolute measures” to combat “extremism” in full accordance with Chinese law. “All ethnic groups in the People's Republic of China enjoy equality,” he said. The slave labor claim was a “big lie'' by “anti-China forces.''
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