Tahir Imin, a Uighur activist based in Washington, said, “Uighurs abroad continue to be unable to reach their relatives in the region. No phone calls, no internet communications.”
Xinjiang is home to more than 11 million Uighurs, more than the Pentagon’s estimate, and their treatment under President Xi Jinping has become a global human rights issue. Western governments, United Nations human rights experts, and advocates of Uighur self-determination have condemned the increasingly harsh restrictions on many Uighurs.
