{"id":4180,"date":"2018-10-11T11:34:15","date_gmt":"2018-10-11T11:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iuhrdf.org\/en\/2018\/10\/11\/rebiya-kadeer-open-letter-bengali-and-indian-muslims\/"},"modified":"2018-10-11T11:34:15","modified_gmt":"2018-10-11T11:34:15","slug":"rebiya-kadeer-open-letter-bengali-and-indian-muslims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/rebiya-kadeer-open-letter-bengali-and-indian-muslims\/","title":{"rendered":"Rebiya Kadeer: Open Letter to Bengali and Indian Muslims"},"content":{"rendered":"
Respectable Bengali and Indian Muslim Brothers and Sisters: <\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/div>\n
The action you took on September 13 and 14 to show your support of our people and condemn the Chinese government was an injection of hope into the hearts of our people inside and outside East Turkestan. It was no surprise to us as Uyghur activists that China would imprison one million of our people because the Chinese government has long been intending to eradicate our people as a nation and make our precious land their own forever. In 1949, they invaded our homeland and began applying their purpose in various ways. <\/span><\/div>\n
Today, the camps are blatant evidence of their plan to destroy our people openly and march ahead with their aim. What was most disturbing to us was that the world was silent in the face of such brutal persecution. Especially after the existence of such concentration camps <\/span>was<\/span><\/span> publicized, there was still no sound from the Islamic countries that are our religious brothers. <\/span><\/div>\n
Early this year, I submitted reports and requests to the state governments of the Western and Islamic countries that have diplomatic relations with China. My request was to close the camps in China which would punish the Chinese government, and if that was not possible, then to pressure the Chinese government diplomatically and barring that, to vocally condemn the Chinese government’s actions. <\/span><\/div>\n
Thus far, the US government and the European Parliament took the situation seriously but not enough to react appropriately. But not a single Islamic State or country spoke a single word, and even when the media of these nations spoke with us, they were deaf and mute. When we sound our concerns to the Western countries and organizations, why do the Islamic states make no sound? If they had spoken, we would be silent. <\/span><\/div>\n
When we saw thousands of brothers and sisters in Bengal and India going out onto the streets for us, we were overjoyed and felt that we were not alone. We saw that if the actions and words against injustice in the Islamic world <\/span>were<\/span><\/span> not enough then at least the heart of the people against injustice had not disappeared. We’ve seen that those impoverished do not look at the economic benefits that come from China but instead to the infinite and high wealth of faith that is superior to the material wealth of money and weapons. <\/span><\/div>\n
We’ve seen proof that God is with the oppressed, not with the oppressor. Today, more than a million Uyghurs are interned in those camps. Entire Uyghur families have been separated, family members have not seen each other for a year and a half and have no idea where or how their loved ones are. Our people have been struggling against this persecution over the past 68 years with the weapon of faith alone. Thus, China is attacking our peoples Iman, their faith.  They want to change our Uyghur and Kazakh Muslims into Chinese atheists. <\/span><\/div>\n
Our Uyghur national identity is not our choice. It is the will of Allah, so it will never be possible for China to want to \u201cchange\u201d our national identity. We believe that we will live as Uyghur Muslims in this world until the hereafter and we will continue to struggle to live this way until then. <\/span><\/div>\n
Our expectation from our Brothers is that you not side with the tyrant but have your voices and hearts be with us. Such support would not only be an encouragement to us but to our brothers and sisters in the Islamic world, knowing that a million brothers and sisters are imprisoned in the Chinese concentration camps and seeing politicians and the media question their state’s consciences. Moreover, such support will cause the Asian states to be informed about these camps and will potentially lead to action sooner. <\/span><\/div>\n
Brothers, may Allah bless you! May Allah will your organizations and leaders to be successful. <\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/div>\n
World Uyghur Congress President Rebiya Kadeer<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Respectable Bengali and Indian Muslim Brothers and Sisters:    The action you took on September 13 and 14 to show your support of our people and condemn the Chinese government…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-4180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4180\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4180"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=4180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}