“I just woke up from a nightmare. I went back to Urumqi. I was surrounded by Chinese police at my arrival. They took me to a dark place. I heard horrible noises. I thought of quick dying without being forced to speak against my people.”
Uighur exiled activist Tahir Imin reacting to the latest round of reports from North-West China speaks of the nightmares that still haunt his nights. On waking, he realizes with relief that he is free. “I woke up to see I am in America. I said, Oh thank God, thank America, a free country to save me from nightmare life in China.” But his exhilaration is short-lived. “This is my everyday life. I am free physically, but my spirit is imprisoned along with millions of Uighurs detained in the camps.”
“Tahir Imin, himself a former political prisoner has reported fellow exiles asking whether taking their own lives was an option. They were wondering “If suicide wasn’t a sin” in their religion, he said.
The most common question asked since the iron fist of Chen Quanguo took control of Xinjiang province in 2016, corralling hundreds of thousands of their countryfolk into camps, has been, “Why are we still alive?” he said. They ask, “what is the point of living under such shame, such pains, without doing anything?”
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He described the helplessness of those left behind in the free world, waiting and hoping in vain for news of loved ones. “They really don’t know what to do more than praying, crying, giving testimonies, speaking to media, going to protests or writing something,” he wrote.”
