The Facebook account of the Kazakh human rights organization Atajurt Volunteers was “permanently shut down” on Saturday. This is the second time in two months that their Facebook account has been blocked, the organization’s founder, Serkjian, told the station.
Atajulte, a volunteer organization concerned about the human rights situation in Xinjiang, China, had its Facebook account blocked again. In an interview with Radio Free Asia on Sunday evening, the organization’s founder, Serik Jian, said that their account was permanently shut down without any warning or explanation as to why: “Our account was blocked for the first time on November 16, 2020, and the second time yesterday, and we could not recover it even if we complained. They made me download the information about it online, which is tantamount to permanently blocking my account.”
Atajulte’s website is dedicated to publicizing the “re-education camps” in Xinjiang, featuring personal accounts of those released from the camps and their experiences in Xinjiang, including dungeons, torture, and other human rights violations not known to the outside world.
Over 30,000 Witnesses in Atajulte
All the testimonies and articles about our family members or relatives who were imprisoned in concentration camps in Xinjiang, China,” said Selkjian. Because we at Attajulte Volunteers have gone through the ordeal of collecting more than 30,000 witness testimonies, we keep breaking evidence to the Western media about human rights abuses in the Xinjiang re-education camps.”
Atajulte’s rescue operation has caused discontent among pro-China organizations in Kazakhstan, which have accused the organization of “undermining Kazakh-Chinese friendship” and have filed legal action against the organization. Serkjian left Kazakhstan last year to register the Atajulte volunteer organization in Turkey. But he continues to be attacked by Internet users of unknown origin.
This has led to attacks from pro-China and pro-Beijing people on Facebook and other social media,” Serkjian said. On January 9, they suddenly sent us a notice saying that they had violated social media rules, without specifying what the rules were. I think there are a large number of pro-communist people on Facebook’s staff who use their work to facilitate helping the Chinese Communist Party.”
A long-standing commitment to improving the human rights situation of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, as well as exposing the inner workings of the Xinjiang re-education camp’s persecution of detainees, has drawn increasing international media attention in recent years. During his visit to Kazakhstan last year, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo specifically met with the families of Kazakh political victims in Xinjiang.
Scholar blames “Fifty Cents” and pro-Beijing activists
The first is to reveal the real evidence of the problem of the concentration camps in Xinjiang, China, and the real facts about the real existence of the camps and the real accusations of the ordeal they suffered. This is unacceptable to the Chinese Communist regime, which does not recognize the existence of the Xinjiang concentration camps, and the spokesman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry has hardly ever clarified the issues exposed by Atajulte, because they are true stories.”
Secondly, Raiskhan said that many of the organization’s researchers are “China-literate”: “There is a lot of analysis of China’s trade in Central Asian countries and risk warnings to Central Asian countries regarding China’s ‘Belt and Road’ debt trap China has a significant influence in Central Asian countries and all Turkic-speaking countries. Because of the above, a large number of pro-communist Chinese and so-called non-Han Chinese organizations have organized a large number of water forces to Facebook, Twitter and other media to complain about the Atajulte Organization’s web pages, which have been blocked time and again.”
Atajulte organization has a big influence in Central Asia
The information published by the organization has a great influence in Turkic-speaking countries, Serkjian said: “It is very influential in the whole Kazakh-speaking society, not only in Kazakhstan, but also in Kyrgyzstan and other Turkic-speaking countries. Because we report every day about the human rights abuses in the Xinjiang concentration camps, live broadcasts, political commentaries, etc., we keep reporting.”
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