{"id":4552,"date":"2018-11-21T18:39:09","date_gmt":"2018-11-21T18:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iuhrdf.org\/en\/2018\/11\/21\/us-hundreds-march-solidarity-uyghurs\/"},"modified":"2018-11-21T18:39:09","modified_gmt":"2018-11-21T18:39:09","slug":"us-hundreds-march-solidarity-uyghurs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/us-hundreds-march-solidarity-uyghurs\/","title":{"rendered":"US: Hundreds march in solidarity for Uyghurs"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Hundreds of protesters took to the streets Tuesday to participate in a rally for Uyghurs and raise awareness about the occupation of East Turkestan.<\/span><\/p>\n

Demonstrators wearing prison jumpsuits to resemble Uyghurs imprisoned by Chinese authorities marched in the front, chanting \u201cfree our brothers, free our sisters.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

At the U.S. Capitol building, crowds waved their U.S. and East Turkestan flags as they held signs calling for \u201cfreedom and independence for East Turkestan.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI come from China, but the name of my country is East Turkestan. I am not Chinese, but I am a Muslim,\u201d said protester Mihirgul Tursun.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tursun told Anadolu Agency she was imprisoned in China after returning home from her studies in Egypt in 2015.<\/span><\/p>\n

At the airport in China, she said she was asked what she did in Egypt, why she wore a hijab and whether she was an Islamist.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEast Turkestan is not a part of China. China is occupying our country, our Muslims just because we <\/span>pray,<\/span> because we say \u2018Salaam Alaykum,\u2019\u201d said Tursun, \u201cThey outlaw going to the masjid, reading Quran, wearing hijab and eating anything that is halal.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur country is facing a lot of oppression. May the rest of the Muslims help us their prayers,\u201d Tursun added.<\/span><\/p>\n

While the demonstration was comprised of mostly Uyghurs, some American Muslims also joined in support.<\/span><\/p>\n

Prominent Islamic scholar and head of the non-profit Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research, Omar Suleiman, urged support for the Uyghur cause.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cTo those who have your relatives that are still over there, just know that your brothers and sisters here also are for you [God willing],\u201d Suleiman told the crowd.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we\u2019ll make sure that every single person in this building who talks about religious freedom, who talks about dignity, who talks about safety, does not get away with omitting your cause,\u201d Suleiman added, referring to Congress. \u201cThey know that the cause of the Uyghurs is the greatest violation of religious freedom in the entire world.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Many refer to China\u2019s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region \u2014 home to many ethnic minorities, including the Turkic Uyghur people \u2014 as East Turkestan.<\/span><\/p>\n

They believe Uyghurs are among a number of Turkic tribes that inhabit the <\/span>region,<\/span> and consider it to be a part of Central Asia, not China.<\/span><\/p>\n

Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group that <\/span>make up<\/span> 45 percent of the population of Xinjiang, accuse China of carrying out repressive policies that restrain their religious, commercial and cultural activities.<\/span><\/p>\n

Source: https:\/\/www.aa.com.tr\/en\/todays-headlines\/us-hundreds-march-in-solidarity-for-uyghurs\/1310732<\/span><\/p>\n

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Hundreds of protesters took to the streets Tuesday to participate in a rally for Uyghurs and raise awareness about the occupation of East Turkestan. Demonstrators wearing prison jumpsuits to resemble…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4551,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-4552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552","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=4552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=4552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}