Thread by @dakekang

1/We were given extraordinary access to the largest detention center in Xinjiang - a behemoth that holds 10,000++. Officials said it's a pre-trial detention center that has nothing to do with the "training centers", which they insist are closed. BUT - we looked into it, and...

https://twitter.com/AP/status/1418084901342130183

2/...in fact, this Dabancheng facility was actually once the "Urumqi City Vocational Skills Training Center". There's hard photographic evidence. In 2018, Reuters went. The nameplate was 乌鲁木齐市职业技能教育培训中心. When we went in April, it changed - to 乌鲁木齐市第三看守所

3/Construction bids, leaked police reports, and interviews corroborate this. One company won an $11 million contract to outfit the Urumqi "training center". They took down their notice after we reached out, but it still lives on in web archives.
webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache…

4/When we asked Urumqi security official Zhao Zhongwei why the city needed such a huge detention center, he claimed arrest rates hadn't risen. He said it was built for safety reasons.

But Xinjiang's own stats tell a different story: skyrocketing arrest rates starting in 2017

5/The tour appeared to be an attempt to retrospectively legally justify their mass detention campaign in Xinjiang. It's part of a broader shift from the makeshift and extrajudicial “training centers” into a more permanent system of prisons and pre-trial detention facilities.

6/Officials say only criminals are detained. But legal cases in XJ are shrouded in secrecy. The little that's leaked shows sentences are handed down for things like... telling others to pray before eating. Relatives say loved ones have been locked up just for sending money abroad

7/As @shahitbiz has documented diligently, many people who appear to be innocent of any crime are being locked up and given long prison sentences. Though XJ authorities say many have been involved in terrorism, in most cases they've provided no evidence to back their claims.