The Geneva Summit for Human Rights & Democracy 2023

Read The Script:

Right now, there are over 3 million people in concentration camps in East Turkistan. The government will say that those numbers are exaggerated, that they’re re-educating Muslim terrorists & political dissidents. But it is a lie. I’ve worked inside those camps and I’m here to tell you what I witnessed with my own eyes. By the end of my story, I think you’ll agree – there’s only one word to describe what’s happening in China: genocide.

I’m a Chinese Language Teacher from East Turkistan, what the CCP calls “Xinjiang.” And after 28 years of teaching, on February 28, 2016, the president of my school called me into his office and said, “Go to the party committee office tomorrow at 1:30 pm. You have an important meeting.” I asked what about it, but he didn’t know.

I showed up and recognized a few other teachers from our district. The Party Secretary of the Regional Education Department Song Li Ying closed the door and said, “We’ve just started a new semester and we’ve gathered a number of illiterates for you. Starting tomorrow, March 1st, you’ll teach the national language (Mandarin Chinese) to them at designated locations. When you go there, don’t tell anyone what you saw, what you heard, or what you knew. Keep it very confidential. Don’t mention it to the school leaders, principals, or even your coworkers, friends and your family members.” I thought that was strange, but before I could ask, Song Li said: “Kalbinur teacher, your daughter is in the Netherlands, right? The Netherlands and China have very close relationship.” I knew what it was – a threat. I had no choice but to accept their offer and stay quiet. So I signed my name and stamped my fingers with ink.

The next morning, a police officer picked me up & drove me to the designated location. It was a four-story building inside a compound with walls covered in barbed wire and a series of strong, electric doors. The policeman tapped a card to let me in and a female worker asked, “Teacher, are you ready? We can bring in the students.” I said yes. On the right of the corridor, she unlocked 3 doors, one with an electronic keypad, one with a regular padlock, and a third intertwined by wires. She shouted “Class is starting, class is starting!” and then I saw the 97 so-called illiterate students coming out of their cells. They were older adults with chains on their hands and feet. My heart started pounding. I felt total despair and hopelessness. But I was surrounded by armed police. “My name is Kalbinur,” I said, “I will teach you the national language starting today” and then I quickly turned to the board to start writing Chinese vowels – because I knew if I looked at them much longer, I would break down crying. Later in the lesson, I noticed eight surveillance cameras in the room, 2 monitoring me from the top of the board. It was the longest and scariest four hours of my entire teaching career.

At 12 o’clock, we went outside and the female workers said they were going to distribute the detainees’ food. “I want to help, too,” I said. They agreed. They started scooping out rice soup, but it was almost entirely water. I started handing out bread, one piece per person. I gave two elderly people an extra piece and didn’t think it would be a problem until someone yelled, “bread is missing!” There was a momentary panic – but a worker said it must have been the kitchen’s mistake. She told me everything is carefully counted and asked me not to help again because I almost put them in danger. I was horrified.

As the weeks passed, there was a constant influx of new prisoners. I taught six to seven hours a day, to a different group every hour. Most weeks, I didn’t see the same prisoners twice, so there must have been 7-8 thousand detainees. They didn’t shower. Each floor had just one toilet but no toilet paper. And they slept on the cold concrete floor.

One time, I went to pour myself a cup of tea and a worker came running at me, shouting, “Hey teacher, don’t drink that!” I asked why, but she didn’t have a good reason. I started wondering if they were being poisoned or drugged. Even the most healthy inmates were losing weight dramatically. Over time, many of my students disappeared – they allegedly died on the way to the hospital.

After 6 months, my contract ended and I was so relieved, but then, I was called back for a new job. Starting September 1, 2017, I’d teach at the women’s camp in Tougung. It had 6 floors with at least 20 cells per floor, roughly 8,000 inmates in the building. At a simple glance, the women looked like men. Their heads were shaved and they were given shots to stop their menstrual cycles. Male police officers bragged about how many women they raped. My Chinese friend told me that they’d bring the women into an interrogation room and force them to confess to crimes they’d never committed. Then 4 or 5 police officers would rape the girl, one after another. They’d take an electric rod and stick it into her vagina or rectum to torture her, and they’d rape her again.

I was supposed to teach at the women’s camp through March, but in November, my period didn’t stop for 15 days and I was sent to the hospital. The police were furious – they replaced me with another teacher, and when I got back to my school in February, I was forced to retire. Two months later, I got a call from a young lady saying, “you have to go to the police station to get an IUD procedure.” “What are you talking about?!” I said, “I just turned 50!” She said it was the policy – all women ages 18-59 must be subjected to birth control procedure and if you don’t get it done, you and your family will be punished. But then, when I was sterilized, I lost a lot of blood. My daughter insisted that I come to the Netherlands to get medical care. I told my husband I’d be gone for a month, but I never came home. Two years after I left, I got an unexpected call on WeChat from a Chinese Police Officer. He passed the phone to my husband, who was angry. He said: “I don’t want to have anything to do with you. From today forward, we’re divorced.” I knew immediately that he was being forced to say that by police. Then, one month ago, I found out that my brother passed away. He went to the hospital for a cold, and the next day he died under mysterious circumstances. The CCP won’t just ruin your life — they’ll go after your entire family too.

I could talk for hours about what I witnessed in the camps, how families are torn apart, how companies profit from forced labor, and how the Chinese government uses civilians to spy on and torture Uyghur people. I can only say so much today – but let me be clear: the Chinese government is systematically torturing, sterilizing, enslaving, and murdering the people of East Turkistan. We need to act like they’re committing genocide against millions of people – because they are.

Thank you.

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