The Activist Who Challenged Chinese Authorities and Won Her Spouse's Freedom

In July 2021, Zeynure Hasan was at her home in Turkey's largest city when she received a long-awaited phone call from her husband. It had been four painful days since their last communication, when he was getting ready to board a flight to Casablanca. The silence had been unbearable.

But the update her husband Idris revealed was even worse. He informed her that upon landing in Morocco, he had been arrested and jailed. Authorities told him he would be deported to China. "Reach out to everyone who can assist me," he pleaded, before the line went dead.

Existence as Uyghurs in Exile

The wife, 31 years old, and Idris, in his late thirties, are members of the Uyghur ethnic group, which makes up about 50% of the population in China's north-western Xinjiang province. Over the last ten years, more than a million Uyghurs are estimated to have been imprisoned in alleged "vocational training camps," where they faced torture for ordinary actions like going to a mosque or using a headscarf.

The couple had been among thousands of Uyghurs who fled to Turkey during the 2010s. They hoped they would find safety in exile, but quickly found they were mistaken.

"Authorities informed me that the Chinese government warned to shut down all its factories in the nation if Morocco freed him," she explained.

After settling in Istanbul, Zeynure became an language instructor, while Idris started as a translator and artist, helping to produce Uyghur news and publications. They had a family of three kids and enjoyed able to live as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's best friends, who was employed in a book repository stocking Uyghur books, was arrested in the summer of 2021, Idris panicked. Reports indicated that Beijing was pressuring Turkey to extradite Uyghurs. Idris felt vulnerable due to his prior arrest, which he suspected was linked to his work with advocates and promoting Uyghur culture. He chose to escape to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had lapsed, had to remain with the children until her husband could request a visa for the family.

A Terrible Mistake

Departing Turkey turned out to be a disastrous decision. At the Istanbul airport, immigration officials pulled him aside for questioning. "After he was finally permitted to get on the plane, he told me how relieved he was that they had let him go, but it felt like a trap to me," she recalled. Her worst fears were realized when he was taken off the plane and arrested by Moroccan authorities.

Over the past decade, China has been utilizing the international police agency Interpol to target political refugees and had requested for Idris to be added on the agency's most-wanted "alert list." Zeynure claims Turkish officials allowed him board the flight knowing he would be arrested upon arrival in Morocco.

What followed would convince her to do what many Uyghurs fear most: defy China, regardless of the consequences.

Family Pressure

Soon after hearing of her husband's arrest, Zeynure received an unexpected phone call from her parents in Xinjiang. She had been cut off from her family since they visited her in Turkey in 2016 and were jailed for several months upon their return to China.

Her parents had a disturbing message. "They said, 'We know your husband is not with you. Perhaps we can assist you,'" she stated. "I knew there must be some police there with them and just acted like I didn't know anything. But they persisted and told me not to do anything to help my husband. 'Don't do anything except feeding your children,' they told me. 'Don't say anything negative about China.'"

But with her husband's life at stake, the softly spoken Zeynure was not going to stay quiet. She had been raised witnessing women having their hijabs forcibly removed in open by the police and had been resolved to live in a country with freedom of belief.

"Before my husband was arrested in Morocco, I didn't do anything. I was just looking after my family; I didn't even have Facebook or these platforms. But I had to do something to save my husband – I had to tell the truth to the world. Everyone knows Uyghurs deported to China will be abused or die. They forced me to speak out."

Growing Up in Xinjiang

Zeynure has two distinct types of memories of her early years in Xinjiang. The first was of blissful days spent in the countryside with her grandparents, who were agricultural workers. "I'd play with the sheep and poultry. I don't know if I will ever have that type of opportunity again. The family around the home and farm. It was too beautiful, like a picture from a story."

The second was as a Muslim Uyghur in Xinjiang, of school holidays interrupted by mandatory teachings of "political anthems" and being banned from attending the religious site or observing Ramadan.

China claims it is addressing radicalism through 'controlling unauthorized religious activities' and 'training centers', but other countries, including the US, say its actions constitute ethnic cleansing. Zeynure says she never felt able to practice her faith in Xinjiang. "People who went on religious journey to Mecca in Saudi Arabia were detained and sent to prison and told they must have some problem in their brain.

"They aimed for Uyghur people to forget their religion and culture. They said 'you should believe in us, we gave you jobs and this good living here'," says Zeynure.

She finally decided to leave China after coming back home from college in another part of China to a growing crackdown on beliefs in 2011. It was then that she was introduced to Idris by one of her classmates. "She knew we both had made the choice to go abroad and told us maybe we could meet and go together."

Zeynure says she was right away reassured by Idris. "I saw he was very honest and reserved, and couldn't tell lies or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to wed me, but Idris was different."

Fresh Start in Turkey

Within two months they were married and prepared to leave for a new life in Turkey. They knew it was an Islamic country with many believers and Uyghurs already residing there, with a comparable language and shared ethnicity. "It was like Uyghurs' second home," says Zeynure. As a teacher and creative, they could also help the community in exile. "We have many children now in China being raised without Uyghur culture or language so we think it's our responsibility to not let it disappear," she says.

But their relief at locating a place of safety overseas was short-lived. Beijing has become a global leader in targeting dissidents living in exile through the use of monitoring, intimidation and violence. But what Idris was faced was a newer method of repression: using China's increasing economic leverage to pressure other nations to yield to its will, including detaining and deporting Uyghurs it wants to silence.

Campaigning for Freedom

After the phone call from Idris, and discovering he had an Interpol alert hanging over him, Zeynure knew she only had a short window of chance to try to prevent his extradition to China. She immediately reached out to as many Uyghur support groups as she could find advertised on the internet in the EU and the US and pleaded for assistance. She was brave despite China having already demonstrated a willingness to target the relatives of other individuals.

Zeynure started demonstrating with her children at the Moroccan embassy in Istanbul, and posting information on social media. To her amazement, copycat protests soon followed in Morocco demanding Idris's freedom. Moroccan officials were forced to issue a announcement saying his deportation was a matter for the judicial system to decide.

In early August 2021, Interpol withdrew Idris's alert after being urged to review his case by human rights groups. But that did not stop a Moroccan court later ruling he should still be sent back to China. Zeynure says there was huge political influence from Beijing, which made {little sense|