Database Entry: Uyghur Detainee in BBC Video Report on Xinjiang Camps Identified as Cultural Official
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Uyghur Detainee in BBC Video Report on Xinjiang Camps Identified as Cultural Official

July 29, 2019
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A detainee in a video report documenting China’s mass incarceration of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) has been identified as a former cultural official from Kashgar (in Chinese, Kashi) prefecture and father of two, according to a source.



A former resident of the seat of Kashgar prefecture recently informed RFA that he had identified one of the detainees in the video—shown studying at a camp in the city known as No. 4 Middle School—as a classmate of his in elementary school named Akber Ebeydulla, who he said had been working as an official with Kashgar Department of Cultural Heritage.



Ebeydulla, who had received multiple awards for his work at both the prefectural and regional level, was detained because he had been too “proud” while explaining Uyghur cultural heritage to foreigners and was suspected of “harming the state,” the source said.

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