Raja Krishnamoorthi, the Ranking Member of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), joined the Committee's Chairman, Mike Gallagher, in condemning the CCP's sentencing of Uyghur scholar Rahile Dawut to life in prison.
"The Chinese Communist Party’s continued genocide against the Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious minority groups is a violation of international standards protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms," Krishnamoorthi said. "The CCP insists the PRC is a 'law-based country,' but its repeated invoking of the law as a tool for the repression of Uyghur culture and traditions says otherwise. It must stop, and Professor Dawut and all other illegally imprisoned individuals must be released immediately."
Newly unearthed documents by the Dui Hua Foundation have confirmed that Rahile Dawut, a professor at Xinjiang University and the founder of its Ethnic Minorities Folklore Research Center, who had been reported missing since 2017, is, in fact, serving a life sentence. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has accused her of endangering state security by studying and promoting Uyghur culture, which goes against their efforts to eradicate this cultural heritage. Dawut is among the numerous scholars who have been detained, and it is estimated that there are approximately 400 in total, according to the Associated Press.
The Dui Hua Foundation, established in 1999 in California, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to humanitarian efforts within China. Their mission revolves around advocating for "clemency and better treatment for at-risk detainees through the promotion of universally recognized human rights". They concentrate their efforts on various aspects, including "political and religious prisoners, juvenile justice, women in prison, and issues in criminal justice", according to their website.
"Professor Dawut and other Uyghur intellectuals, including Ilham Tohti, have been unjustly imprisoned for their work to protect and preserve Uyghur culture and traditions," said U.S. Department of State Spokesperson Mike Miller, according to a press release. "Professor Dawut’s life sentence is part of an apparent broader effort by the PRC to eradicate Uyghur identity and culture and undermine academic freedom, including through the use of detentions and disappearances. We continue to call on the PRC government to immediately release Professor Dawut and all individuals who are unjustly detained."
The CCP is accused of establishing re-education camps, where a large number of Uyghur individuals are reportedly being held against their will. These camps are primarily centered around forced labor and detention. Disturbing allegations have emerged, including forced sterilizations of women, slavery occurring within factories, and various reprehensible acts perpetrated against Uyghur families, such as children being taken away from their parents and sent to orphanages, the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies at The George Washington University reports.
"She was a guardian of Uyghur identity, and that’s something the Chinese government is after," said Mukaddas Mijit, a Uyghur ethnomusicologist, according to the Associated Press. "They want to erase everything, and they want Uyghurs to forget how beautiful and colorful a culture they had."
