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WELT AM SONNTAG:
In March the European Union imposed sanctions on four Chinese officials for suppressing the Uyghurs.
These are the first sanctions for human rights violations in more than 30 years.
How do you rate the step?
Dolkun Isa:
We welcome the sanctions. They are a clear signal that the Chinese state cannot simply commit genocide and get away with it. But the sanctions are not enough. The four sanctioned officials are only remotely involved in the crimes. The main culprit, Xinjiang Party leader Chen Quanguo, is not on the list. He belongs on the list like no other. We also welcome the efforts of the federal government in Germany. Behind the scenes, she helped bring about European sanctions. But when you look at how Germany positions itself towards the oppression of the Uyghurs, that's disappointing. The USA, Canada and the Netherlands now refer to the crimes as "genocide". We call on the federal governmentto imitate these countries. Unfortunately, Chancellor Angela Merkel is silent on this issue. In 2007 she met the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetans. We asked for a meeting with the Federal Chancellor in 2018. Until today she has not met with us.
Dolkun Isa, President of the World Uyghur Congress
Source: REUTERS
WELT AM SONNTAG:
The suppression of the Uyghurs is now also causing economic upheaval.
The Swedish company H&M no longer sources cotton from Xinjiang after reports of forced labor - and has recently been boycotted in China for this.
The German company Hugo Boss also announced last year that it would no longer use cotton from Xinjiang, but has since withdrawn it.
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Isa:
German companies have to stop doing business in Xinjiang.
Those who do not make themselves assistants in a genocide.
Should Hugo Boss still source cotton from Xinjiang, the company will have blood on its hands.
WELT AM SONNTAG:
Your mother died in a Chinese internment camp.
How did you find out about it?
Isa:
Until 2017, I spoke to my parents on the phone regularly, about once a week.
Then in April my mother suddenly said on the phone that I shouldn't call her again, never again.
That was weird.
After all, I have been considered a terrorist in China since 2003.
In all these years she has never said anything like that.
She must have guessed something.
Of course I called again anyway.
But a few months later she didn't answer again.
I tried calling my siblings.
But they didn't answer the phone either.
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WELT AM SONNTAG: Was
there no longer any way to reach you?
Isa:
In the summer of 2018, a friend told me that he had heard that my mother had died in a detention center. I didn't know if I could trust the information. But shortly thereafter, Radio Free Asia found out that the information was correct. The radio station spoke to officials who confirmed that my mother died in a detention center in her hometown. At the time, I didn't know where my father was. It was only later that I learned from the Chinese state media that my father was also locked in an internment camp in 2017. According to the reports, he died there about a year later. To this day I do not know under what circumstances he died. Killing my parents in revenge for my peaceful human rights activism shows the cowardice of the Chinese regime.
WELT AM SONNTAG:
What about the rest of your family?
Isa:
I have two brothers and a sister.
I heard that one of my brothers was sentenced to 17 years in prison.
I lost contact with my other brother in 2016.
I don't know what happened to him.
My sister is featured in the state media.
Last year, she appeared in a video saying I was using my parents' deaths to slander the Chinese state.
I assume that she was forced to watch this video.