Washington, US: Photos got leaked by Xinjiang Police which helped lot of Uyghur people stying in America to recognise their relatives, family members and friends.
The leaked photos from Xinjiang Police Files have helped many Uyghur Americans to recognize their lost relatives and friends who were detained in Chinese camps for years.
Anwar, an Uyghur American, said he had been “unable to speak or even just communicate” with his family in Xinjiang for five years.
Then, he saw his cousin’s mugshot in what is known as the Xinjiang Police Files, documents and images leaked from within China and released to the public last month.
“I could only hope and pray for the best as I sat combing through each picture of the leaked Xinjiang Police Files,” Anwar said as quoted by Voice of America.
After spending hours combing through countless images, Anwar found the face of his cousin, Arzugul Abdurehim, now 42, in the files.
Mehmet Ali Sultan, a naturalized Uyghur American who has lived in the United States since 2011, also sifted through photos from the Xinjiang Police Files and saw familiar faces of Uyghur detainees from his hometown of Konasheher county.
He found out his former high school classmate, Metyar Ghopur, who was detained in 2017 by Chinese authorities.
“If it weren’t for the leaked files, I would not have been able to learn of the arbitrary detention of my friend and former classmate,” Sultan said over a call to Voice of America.
A trove of files obtained by hacking into China’s Xinjiang police computers contain first-ever image material from inside camps that “implicates top leadership” and has camp security instructions that describe heavily armed strike units with battlefield assault rifles, according to a Washington-based researcher.
Adrian Zenz, Director and Senior Fellow in China Studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation in Washington, said that the material is unprecedented at several levels.
“A huge trove of files obtained by hacking into Xinjiang police/re-education camp computers contain first-ever image material from inside camps, reveal Chen Quanguo issuing shoot-to-kill orders, Xi Jinping demanding new camps because existing ones are overcrowded,” said Adrian Zenz, who made a series of tweets.
China has faced criticism for its “suppression of ethnic minorities including Uyghurs”.
Human rights campaigners have accused the ruling Communist Party of China of committing widespread abuses in Xinjiang in the name of security, steps which include confining people to internment camps, forcibly separating families and carrying out forced sterilization.