Chinese authorities hunt the family of a Washington-based reporter.<\/p>\n
Jan. 20, 2015 7:16 p.m. ET<\/p>\n
Beijing\u2019s censors are nothing if not persistent. Unable to silence a Washington-based reporter directly, Chinese authorities have opted for another approach: Imprison his relatives.<\/p>\n
Shohret Hoshur left China in 1994 after authorities harassed him for reporting in local newspapers about the ethnic and religious discrimination faced by his fellow Uighurs in the northwestern region of Xinjiang. With his family still in Xinjiang, Mr. Hoshur eventually began working for Radio Free Asia, the news service funded by the U.S. government.<\/p>\n
According to recent revelations by RFA, Chinese officials began hounding Mr. Hoshur\u2019s relatives in 2009, after he reported on the death of a Uighur man allegedly tortured by police. Last year police arrested one of Mr. Hoshur\u2019s brothers on the charge of \u201cviolating state security laws\u201d and sentenced him to five years in prison.<\/p>\n
In trying to understand his brother\u2019s trial, Mr. Hoshur spoke by phone with two of his other brothers. Soon they, too, were detained on charges of \u201cleaking state secrets\u201d about their brother\u2019s trial. Mr. Hoshur says they were having \u201ca private conversation about a serious matter that deeply concerns [our] family.\u201d<\/p>\n
Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei says RFA\u2019s account \u201cis completely inconsistent with reality and not worth refuting.\u201d Yet threats, information control and lawless arrests are routine in Xinjiang, home to some 10 million Turkic Muslim Uighurs.<\/p>\n
The government claims that iron-fisted policies are necessary because Uighur extremists have increasingly resorted to terrorism. But government repression far predates the spike in violent extremism.<\/p>\n
Uighur discontent has long stemmed from official discrimination\u2014in schooling, employment and religious worship\u2014and the persecution of moderate Uighur voices such as imprisoned scholar Ilham Tohti. The assault on Mr. Hoshur\u2019s family will do nothing to curb that discontent, while advertising the inhumanity of Beijing\u2019s methods.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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