A couple dozen people gathered outside of the Chinese consulate in Downtown Montreal to call to action the liberation of Uyghurs in China's northwestern autonomous region Xingjiang. Uyghurs are a turkic-ethnic group with centuries of residing in East Turkestan, which was colonized by China in 1949, now known as Xinjiang.
Over a million Uyghurs are reported to be held in reeducation camps in China, detailed in the Xinjiang papers, a set of over 400 pages of leaked internal documents detailing the detention of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang by the Chinese government. The Chinese government says these cam[s are used to prevent religious extremism, but Uyghurs are saying these are to eradicate their culture and assimilate them, as multiple testimonies from survivors of the camps have detailed forced eating of pork, sexual violence and torture. A united Nations report release in 2022 corroborated that Uyghurs were being tortured and experiencing sexual violence in these camps. Uyghur activists say this is a genocide and little action is being taken to stop it.
Activists gathered outside of the Chinese consulate to commemorate 27 years since the Ghulja massacre. On Feb 5, 1997, activists gathered in Ghulja to protest the prohibiting of cultural freedoms. Eyewitnesses said Chinese state police fired into the crowd, killing many demonstrators.
Minimal reporting has been done towards the plight of Uyghurs and reporting that is published is often deemed as upholding western propaganda. Many American politicians, including Senator Marco Rubio, have pushed for this to be deemed a genocide. Critics say this is just a tactic by western politicians to demonize China, but Uyghur activists say this must not distract from the human rights abuses that are happening.
CUTV has been invited to protests and to interview Uyghur activists with open arms, as they say their stories and protests are often underreported and ignored in mainstream media. At this protest, CUTV was one of the two media outlets that showed up to document this event. International Support for Uyghurs, a Montreal-based Uyghur advocacy group, posted about CUTV's attendance at the event and personally thanked us for covering their cause.
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LJI Impact is the section of commediaportal.ca where the journalists and their organizations participating in CACTUS' Local Journalism Initiative can share their greatest successes.
Through the written stories, photos and videos you see in the LJI Impact section, you'll be able to read first hand accounts about how the presence of a community journalist is making a difference in communities across Canada through the Local Journalism Initiative and the Community Media Portal.
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