Traumatized women recount alleged gang rape and 'sadistic' torture in China's concentration camps
Chinese women, who allege they were inside China's concentration camps, claim that "extremely sadistic" guards carried out gang rapes and brutal beatings.
Qelbinur Sidik grew up in Xinjiang and spent 28 years teaching elementary school students age 6 to 13. In 2016, the Saybagh District Bureau of Education informed her that she would be working at an internment camp in Xinjiang, which is believed to be a "re-education camp" for an estimated 1.5 million Uighur and other Muslim ethnic minorities. Sidik claims that she was instructed to teach Mandarin to detainees.
Sidik claims that on her first day in the camp, she met with about 100 men and a handful of women.
"They came in, their feet and hands chained in shackles," Sidik told CNN from her home in the Netherlands. "I turned slightly, I saw their tears falling down their beards, the female detainees were crying loudly."
While in her classroom in the internment camp in northwest China, Sidik claims that she could hear detainees crying and screaming from their cells.
Sidik said a female police officer told her that the male guards would get drunk and brag to each other about how they "raped and tortured girls."
"During the time I was teaching in there, I witnessed horrific tragedy," said Sidik, who is an ethnic Uzbek.
Tursunay Ziyawudun, another alleged witness of the atrocities at the Chinese Communist Party's concentration camp, said she was sent to the camp despite committing no crimes. She was released after a month only to be sent back for a nine-month sentence that she describes as a "nightmare."
Speaking to CNN from the United States, Ziyawudun alleged that large groups of women were given little food and crammed into small spaces. They were "brutally punished for small things like using the facilities for too long," Ziyawudun said, adding that she was beaten so savagely that she passed out.
Another time, guards forced her on to a table where they "inserted a stun baton" inside her and "twisted and shocked" her until she "blacked out" from the pain. A couple of weeks later she was ganged raped by several men, an experience she said happened to her multiple times while in the camps.
"They were extremely sadistic, causing pain and damage to the body by beating and smacking my head on the wall," Ziyawudun said, "It was their way of punishing us."
Ziawudun also gave an interview to BBC, where she detailed her time at the detainment center. She alleged that after midnight, men who were wearing suits and not police uniforms took women, including herself, down the corridor to a "black room," where there were no surveillance cameras.
She said she was tortured and gang-raped on three occasions, each time by two or three men.
"Perhaps this is the most unforgettable scar on me forever," she said. "I don't even want these words to spill from my mouth."
After the BBC ran the report of rape and torture at the Xinjiang concentration camp, the CCP permanently banned the British Broadcasting Corporation. The Chinese government accused the BBC of not meeting the government's standards for "true and impartial" reporting, adding that the news organization allegedly "undermined China's national interests and ethnic solidarity."
Mihrigul Tursun, a member of the Uighur minority in China, explained her experience at the internment camp.
"Mihrigul Tursun, speaking to reporters in Washington, said she was interrogated for four days in a row without sleep, had her hair shaved and was subjected to an intrusive medical examination following her second arrest in China in 2017. After she was arrested a third time, the treatment grew worse," CBS News reported in 2018.
Tursun said that the women in the camp were forced to take unknown medication, including "pills that made them faint and a white liquid that caused bleeding in some women and loss of menstruation in others." Tursun said that nine women died during her three-month imprisonment.
The Associated Press reported in June that the Chinese government is "taking draconian measures to slash birth rates among Uighurs and other minorities as part of a sweeping campaign to curb its Muslim population." The investigation discovered "widespread and systematic" efforts to reduce the minority population, including state-mandated pregnancy checks of minority women, forced use of intrauterine devices, sterilization, and abortion.
Xu Guixiang, a spokesperson for the Communist Party publicity department in Xinjiang, released a statement on Feb 1.
"There is no 'rounding up thousands of Uyghur Muslims,'" the spokesperson said. "What we have cracked down on, according to the law, are a few heinous and obstinate leaders and backbones of extremist groups. What we have rescued are those who have been infected with religious extremism and committed minor crimes."
The Chinese Communist Party officially calls the camps "vocational education and training centers."
CNN noted that they have no way of verifying the testimony from Sidik and Ziyawudun, but states they are similar to other accounts from victims of the Chinese concentration camps.
Ziyawudun told CNN, "I am a woman in my forties. Do you think this is something I can be proud of sharing with the world?"
She said, "I would tell them I am not afraid of them anymore, because they already killed my soul."
On Tuesday during a CNN town hall, President Joe Biden said, "And so the idea that I am not going to speak out against what he's doing in Hong Kong, what he's doing with the Uighurs in western mountains of China and Taiwan — trying to end the one China policy by making it forceful … [Xi] gets it."
However, Biden also hinted that some of Xi Jinping's controversial leadership is excusable, "Culturally there are different norms that each country and their leaders are expected to follow."
"If you know anything about Chinese history, it has always been, the time when China has been victimized by the outer world is when they haven't been unified at home," Biden stated. "So the central — well, vastly overstated — the central principle of Xi Jinping is that there must be a united, tightly controlled China. And he uses his rationale for the things he does based on that."
Beijing faces new abuse claims from Xinjiang www.youtube.com
'If not a genocide, something close to it' going on in China: US national security adviser; warns Taiwan of Chinese invasion
United States National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien delivered warnings regarding China on Friday, while also praising Hong Kong's pro-democracy protesters. Speaking at a webinar hosted by the non-partisan Aspen Institute, O'Brien expressed concern over China's iron-fisted rule in the Xinjiang region.
"If not a genocide, something close to it going on in Xinjiang," O'Brien told the online audience. Xinjiang is home to millions of China's ethnic minority of Uighur Muslims. The northwest region of China is also home to internment camps, which the Chinese Communist Party officially calls "vocational education and training centers."
There could be as many as 3 million Uighur Muslims detained in the secret re-education camps, according to Randall Schriver, former U.S. assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs.
O'Brien said, "The Chinese are literally shaving the heads of Uighur women and making hair products and sending them to the United States."
O'Brien is citing the seizure of 13 tons of hair products worth more than $800,000 at the Port of New York/Newark by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection in June. The confiscation of human hair products, which originated from Xinjiang, points to "potential human rights abuses of forced child labor and imprisonment" by China.
O'Brien was also troubled by the crackdown of Hong Kong pro-democracy demonstrators by the Chinese government.
"Anyone who's been to Hong Kong and spent time there, it's sad what's going to happen. Hong Kong has been fully absorbed into China," O'Brien stated. "It'd be great if we had more immigrants from Hong Kong. They're terrific people."
The National Security Adviser also warned Taiwan to bolster its military to defend against a possible invasion by China.
"I think Taiwan needs to start looking at some asymmetric and anti-access area denial strategies and so on and really fortify itself in a manner that would deter the Chinese from any sort of amphibious invasion or even a gray zone operation against them," O'Brien said at the event.
O'Brien added that China doesn't want to do an amphibious landing on Taiwan, "It would be a hard operation for the Chinese to do." He added an animal aphorism, "Lions generally don't like to eat porcupines; they can, but they prefer not to."
Earlier this week, the Trump administration informed Congress that it plans to sell advanced weapons systems to Taiwan.
"The U.S. sales involve the Lockheed Martin-made High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, a truck-mounted rocket launcher; the Boeing-made over-the-horizon, precision strike missile Standoff Land Attack Missile-Expanded Response; and external sensor pods for Taiwan's F-16 jets," as reported by Defense News.
Last month, the Trump administration announced they would sell 66 new F-16 fighter jets to Taiwan.
O'Brien said that Beijing would be forced to consider possible retaliation by the United States for China's aggression. "We have a lot of tools in the toolkit that, if we got involved, could make that a very dangerous effort for China to engage in," O'Brien said.
"China is truly the challenge for the United States for this generation," O'Brien said, "I hope we're not enemies, although I understand that Xi Jinping was telling his troops this morning to prepare for war."
O'Brien is referring to Xi's appearance at a military base near Shantou in the east of the province this week, where he reportedly told troops, "[You should] focus your minds and energy on preparing to go to war, and stay highly vigilant."
These allegations come on the heels of the New York Post's bombshell report that Hunter Biden allegedly pursued "lasting and lucrative" deals with a Chinese energy company that he said would be "interesting for me and my family." A source familiar with the negotiation of the deal and who was one of the people included on the reported email claimed that Joe Biden was named in the email and would profit off the deal with CEFC China Energy Co.
China has been confronted about reported ethnic cleansing in the past, but has denied all wrongdoing. As seen on BlazeTV, Glenn Beck discussed leaked video that purportedly shows hundreds of shaven Uighur Muslims who are bound, blindfolded, and being boarded onto trains by soldiers.
Leaked video EXPOSES Uighur ethnic cleansing in China & AMBASSADOR tries to justify it www.youtube.com
Rudy Gobert becomes first NBA player to speak out against concentration camps in China: 'Wrong is wrong'
Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert publicly denounced China for reportedly operating concentration camps on Thursday. Gobert, who is French, becomes the first NBA player to condemn China over alleged human rights violations against Uighur Muslims.
Gobert, who made headlines in March when he was the first NBA player to test positive for COVID-19, shared an Instagram story with the caption: "Wrong is wrong."
Gobert's message linked to an Instagram post by French actor Omar Sy's Instagram that has a light blue background to represent the blue flag of East Turkestan. The post featured the caption: "Millions of Uyghur Muslims are detained and tortured in concentration camps in China. Not for what they do, but for who they are. It is the largest mass incarceration of the 21st century. It has to end. #FreeUyghurs."
"Wrong is wrong"@NBA player @rudygobert27 participated in MEPs @rglucks1 @bueti @EnginEroglu_FW campaign to call… https://t.co/lTDSwhJtvX— WorldUyghurCongress (@WorldUyghurCongress)1601576814.0
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) applauded Gobert's rebuke of China with a tweet that said: "This is big. Rudy Gobert of the @utahjazz calling out oppression of #Uighurs - first @NBA player to do so publicly."
This is big. Rudy Gobert of the @utahjazz calling out oppression of #Uighurs - first @NBA player to do so publicly https://t.co/VE4cG6X1O4— Josh Hawley (@Josh Hawley)1601596519.0
Hawley previously called out the NBA for its cozy relationship with the communist country. Hawley wrote a letter to NBA Commissioner Adam Silver in July, where he lambasted the hypocrisy of the basketball league's policy of allowing players to select social activism messages on their jerseys such as "Black Lives Matter," "I Can't Breathe," and "Anti-Racist," but no messages about the Chinese internment camps.
Hawley also asked Silver why none of the 29 approved social justice messages are "in support of victims of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), including the people of Hong Kong, whose remaining freedoms are being extinguished by the CCP's newly-enacted national security law."
The last NBA employee who criticized China was castigated severely. Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey expressed support for Hong Kong protesters in a tweet posted on Oct. 4, 2019. Morey showed support for the pro-democracy protesters with a tweet that read: "Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong."
Rockets' management quickly condemned Morey's tweet. NBA players also attacked the Rockets GM, including LeBron James, who reportedly questioned Commissioner Silver as to why Morey wasn't being punished for his tweet.
Despite Morey apologizing, China immediately retaliated harshly. China's state-owned CCTV and Tencent, the NBA's streaming partner in China, stopped airing NBA games in China.
In July, ESPN released a bombshell report that young players and children were physically abused by coaches at NBA training academies in China, including in the Xinjiang province where internment camps are housing Uighur Muslims.
The Chinese government operates "re-education camps" in Xinjiang, a province located in northwest China. The Chinese Communist Party officially calls the camps "vocational education and training centers."
The labor camps allegedly force Uighur and other Muslim ethnic minorities to assimilate under the guise of countermeasures fighting extremism and terrorism. Detainees must attend indoctrination sessions and are forced to work in factories.
In 2018, the United Nations said there are a million ethnic Uighurs held in what appears to be a "massive internment camp that is shrouded in secrecy" in China. Randall Schriver, former U.S. assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs, estimated that the number of detained Muslims could be "closer to 3 million citizens."
"The (Chinese) Communist Party is using the security forces for mass imprisonment of Chinese Muslims in concentration camps," Schriver told the Pentagon during a briefing in 2019.
Human Rights Watch published a report in September 2018 detailing the "Chinese government's mass arbitrary detention, torture, and mistreatment of Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang and details the systemic and increasingly pervasive controls on daily life."