Latest: A Kazakh man who fled #China's #Xinjiang in 2019 was arrested in Ukraine's western border town Lviv, as he tried to cross into Poland and reach Germany to seek political asylum. He now faces the possible fate of being deported back to #China. dw.com/zh/%E5%93%88%E…
The 23-year-old Yilisen Aierken arrived in Ukraine in mid October, but he lost his travel documents on October 21. He originally wanted to go to the Chinese consulate and seek new copies of his travel documents. But he was afraid of being deported back to #Xinjiang.
He contacted @Atajurt_HR after he was arrested and the founder of Atajurt, Serikzhan Bilash, immediately reached out to U.N. officials in Kazakhstan as well as U.S. and German diplomats in the country, hoping they could help negotiate Aierken's freedom with Ukrainian officials.
U.S. based humanitarian organization @chinaaid immediately contacted officials at @StateDept, hoping they could help to negotiate with the Ukrainian government. Officials in Ukraine then promised not to immediately deport Aierken back to #China.
However, Bilash got a call from Aierken at 5 p.m. Beijing time yesterday. Aierken told Bilash that an official at the local detention center told him that they had gotten him a plane ticket and he would be deported back to #China.
Despite being told by Bilash that Aierken could face serious threats he was deported back to #China, the Ukrainian official hang up the phone. Bilash worried that the Ukrainian government may have decided to order local staff to randomly deport Aierken back to ...
... #China and then claimed that they didn't know Aierken had been sent back to #Xinjiang. Then at 10 p.m. on the same day, Aierken told Bilash that officials at the detention center confiscated his phone and two people were assigned to monitor him.
"I think he is not in a very good condition and there is a possibility that he could be sent back to #China at any time," Bilash told me.
This is not the first time that #Uyghurs or #Kazakhs face the possible fate of being deported back to #China while they were overseas. Three Uyghur men were arrested by police at the airport in Gambia last October, and they were taken to the Chinese embassy there.
Ultimately, they were able to leave after rights groups and @StateDept intervened and negotiated their release. They were originally on their way to Europe before they were arrested.
Here's the story: dw.com/zh/%E4%B8%89%E…
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
