{"id":4387,"date":"2018-11-04T17:00:04","date_gmt":"2018-11-04T17:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iuhrdf.org\/en\/2018\/11\/04\/defying-china-malaysia-releases-uighur-detainees\/"},"modified":"2018-11-04T17:00:04","modified_gmt":"2018-11-04T17:00:04","slug":"defying-china-malaysia-releases-uighur-detainees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/defying-china-malaysia-releases-uighur-detainees\/","title":{"rendered":"Defying China, Malaysia releases Uighur detainees"},"content":{"rendered":"

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters): Malaysia has freed from detention 11 ethnic Uighur Muslims who fled to the South-East Asian nation after a Thai jailbreak last year, and sent them to Turkey, their lawyer said on Thursday, in disregard of China\u2019s request to hand them to Beijing.<\/span><\/p>\n

The move is likely to strain ties with China, already tested since Tun <\/span>Dr<\/span> Mahathir Mohamad became prime minister after a stunning election victory in May and <\/span>cancelled<\/span> more than US$20bil (about RM80bil) worth of projects awarded to Chinese companies.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/div>\n

Prosecutors in Muslim-majority Malaysia dropped charges against the Uighurs on humanitarian grounds and they arrived in Turkey after flying out of Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, their lawyer Fahmi Moin said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe charges were withdrawn because the Attorney General\u2019s Chambers agreed to the (appeal) from our side,\u201d he told <\/span>Reutes<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Immigration Department, Home Ministry <\/span>and<\/span> the Attorney General\u2019s Office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/span><\/p>\n

China\u2019s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/span><\/p>\n

The men were detained and charged with illegally entering Malaysia after last November\u2019s daring prison break, by punching holes in a prison wall and using blankets as ladders.<\/span><\/p>\n

In February, Reuters reported that Malaysia was under great pressure from China to deport the men there, citing sources.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some Western missions sought to dissuade it from sending them to China, which has been accused of persecuting Uighurs.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beijing accuses separatist extremists among the Uighur minority of plotting attacks on China\u2019s Han majority in the restive far western region of Xinjiang and elsewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

China has been accused of rights abuses in Xinjiang, torture of Uighur detainees and tight controls on their religion and culture. It denies wrongdoing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the years, hundreds, possibly thousands, of Uighurs have escaped the unrest by <\/span>travelling<\/span> clandestinely via South-East Asia to Turkey.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Uighurs in Malaysia were part of a group of more than 200 detained in Thailand in 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although they identified themselves as Turkish citizens and asked to be sent to Turkey, more than 100 were forcibly returned to China in July 2015, sparking international condemnation.<\/span><\/p>\n

In February, Malaysia said it was considering China\u2019s request to extradite the 11 men. In the past, it has sent some detained Uighurs to China.<\/span><\/p>\n

Their detention came as Malaysia drew closer to China under former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, but 93-year-old <\/span>Dr<\/span> Mahathir, in his second stint as premier, has been vocal in backing Muslim communities against persecution.<\/span><\/p>\n

He recently <\/span>criticised<\/span> Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of <\/span>neighbouring<\/span> Myanmar, over the Nobel peace laureate\u2019s handling of the Rohingya crisis, saying, \u201cWe don\u2019t really support her anymore.\u201d \u2013Reuters<\/span><\/p>\n


Read more at https:\/\/www.thestar.com.my\/news\/nation\/2018\/10\/11\/defying-china-malaysia-releases-uighur-detainees\/#1ts1FmkXqQlUuvoz.99<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters): Malaysia has freed from detention 11 ethnic Uighur Muslims who fled to the South-East Asian nation after a Thai jailbreak last year, and sent them to Turkey,…<\/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-4387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4387","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=4387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4387\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4387"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=4387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}