Uyghur filmmaker faces trial in Xinjiang and alleges torture

Originally published at The Guardian on Oct. 24, 2023.

A Uyghur film-maker who was arrested in Beijing earlier this year will appear on trial in Xinjiang on Wednesday.

Ikram Nurmehmet, 32, was taken from his home by Chinese authorities on 29 May and flown to Ürümqi, Xinjiang’s capital, where he is being held in pre-trial detention on unknown charges, according to his supporters.

Born and raised in Ürümqi, Nurmehmet is an independent film-maker based in Beijing, where he lives with his wife and infant son.

Hours after his arrest, police called his wife to notify her of his transfer to Xinjiang and asked her to bring clothes for him to the airport. There, she was able to meet Nurmehmet briefly, in the company of three officers who handed her his wedding ring and amulet. He told her she, “must now do the best she can”, a source close to the family told the Guardian.

Nurmehmet’s mother, who lives in Ürümqi, filmed his arrival at the airport in Xinjiang. When she questioned the officers with him, she was told her son was “under investigation”.

Known for portraying Uyghur protagonists in his work, Nurmehmet has directed many short films, some of which have been selected by film festivals in China and abroad. One film, Elephant in the Car, tells the story of a Han Chinese woman sharing a taxi with two Uyghurs.

“His work always focuses on Uyghur people’s real lives, not in a propaganda way,” a source close to Nurmehmet said by phone over an encrypted messaging app. “He’s one of the young Uyghur directors who engages with Chinese society the most, but unfortunately in the end it [led] him being arrested. He’s very responsible for his family. He has a boy who [for] six months has not seen his father.”

A month before his arrest, Nurmehmet had received a call from Xinjiang authorities requesting his return to Ürümqi to investigate the loss of his identity card. He refused and hung up. Later, his mother told him a childhood Uyghur friend he had once hosted while studying in Turkey had allegedly been detained, and warned that Nurmehmet might be under suspicion by association.

Before moving to Beijing, Nurmehmet had spent six years studying film-making at the Marmara University in Istanbul.

Maya Wang, the associate director in the Asia division at Human Rights Watch, said Uyghurs with any connections to Islam, central Asia or the Middle East were automatically under suspicion of terrorism from Chinese authorities. Many were rounded up during a campaign of “collective punishment” and imprisoned arbitrarily without trial.

“People who have these remote connections are considered terrorists or extremists or having ideological viruses,” Wang said. “Many are still held in prison for having visited Turkey, or having attended (Islamic) funerals … Often, you hear of people dying in these facilities.”

The Chinese state launched its “Strike Hard” anti-terrorism campaign in Xinjiang in 2014, after several terrorist attacks reportedly orchestrated by Uyghur separatists. Since then, an estimated half a million people are believed to have been imprisoned during a crackdown that escalated in 2017. Among those with known prison terms, the average time of imprisonment is 12.5 years, according to Human Rights Watch.

“There’s less international attention now because the Chinese say they have closed the [detention] camps,” Wang said. “[But] the camps are part of a bigger, multifaceted campaign against Uyghurs, including the use of long prison sentences. Uyghurs continue to live in a state of fear.”

Nurmehmet had previously been identified on a list of terrorism suspects known as the “Shanghai List”, which was obtained in 2020 by Australian hackers who looked through more than 1m surveillance records from the Shanghai Public Security Bureau.

Last month, a leading Uyghur professor, Rahile Dawut, was reportedly sentenced to life in prison for “endangering state security”. A specialist in Uyghur folklore and traditions, she was reported missing six years ago.

A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in London said: “We are not aware of the specifics that you mentioned. China is advancing law-based governance on all fronts and will continue to uphold the rule of law, conduct law enforcement and protect lawful rights and interests of individuals or organisations in accordance with the law.”

Uyghur film-maker claims he was tortured by authorities in China

Originally published at The Guardian on Nov. 8 2023.

A Uyghur film-maker has alleged he was tortured and forced to give a false confession during detention in Xinjiang province.

Ikram Nurmehmet, 32, appeared on trial at Ürümqi people’s intermediary court on 27 October and is accused of organising “terrorist” activities and participating in an “East Turkestan separatist” group, sources close to him told the Guardian.

Chinese authorities blame the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, which once advocated independence in Xinjiang, for a series of terrorist attacks in the late 1990s and see similar groups as a separatist threat. Nurmehmet denied the allegations and no verdict was announced.

Known for portraying Uyghur protagonists in his work, Nurmehmet spent six years studying film-making in Turkey, which his supporters said made him a target of state scrutiny.

“I was held in a dark room for 20 days and physically tortured,” Nurmehmet reportedly said during the trial, adding that he had been made to give false confessions under duress while in detention. “I never joined any terrorist group or any political activities while I was in Turkey,” he said.

The trial was attended by Nurmehmet’s wife, mother and father, who have not been able to meet him since he was arrested at his home in Beijing and flown to Xinjiang in May.

Nurmehmet has been denied his choice of legal counsel and is being represented by a state-appointed lawyer, according to sources close to him. The lawyer told family members to expect a sentence of more than eight years in prison, and that the verdict may be announced any time from “a week or years” later.

“I kept feeling that he can be released suddenly. It’s always in my mind,” a source close to him told the Guardian. “That’s why I was so disappointed to hear that he [might face] at least eight years in prison.”

Maya Wang, an associate director in Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, called the use of torture “routine” in cases where the accused is facing political charges, especially in Xinjiang. While Chinese law has an exclusionary clause stipulating that any confessions extracted under torture should be excluded in trial, the rule “does not actually function in practice”, she said.

Under Chinese law, the term “terrorism” has a broad definition that can cover anything from producing a politically sensitive film to meeting any overseas Uyghur or human rights activist (who are all considered terrorists by the Chinese state), according to William Nee, a research and advocacy coordinator at Chinese Human Rights Defenders.

In politically sensitive cases where the state would want to control the outcome, authorities will frequently deny families the right to appoint their own legal counsel, Nee added.

Nurmehmet’s supporters are working on submitting a petition to the UN’s working group on arbitrary detention to request more information and continue advocating on his behalf.

In the past year, the working group has issued opinions on three cases involving Uyghurs, all of whom were deemed to be victims of arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance under international law.

Peter Irwin, an associate director for research and advocacy at the Uyghur Human Rights Project, said the persecution of Uyghur intellectuals and cultural elites may be more widespread than reported cases suggested. In Nurmehmet’s case, it is difficult to know whether he was targeted for having studied in Turkey or for his status as a cultural figure, he said.

“There are a lot of people being sentenced who went to Turkey. In some ways, what this film-maker was doing through his work – the humanisation of Uyghurs and [facilitating] communication between Uyghurs and Chinese people – I think the government is suspicious and worries about this kind of stuff.”

The Chinese state launched its Strike Hard anti-terrorism campaign in Xinjiang in 2014, after several terrorist attacks reportedly orchestrated by Uyghur separatists. An estimated half a million people are believed to have been imprisoned during a crackdown that escalated in 2017.

More than 300 intellectuals and members of its cultural elites are currently held in some form of extralegal detention after having disappeared between 2016 and 2021, according to a database by the Uyghur Human Rights Project.