CFU PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 19, 2025, 9:00 AM EST
Contact: contact@campaignforuyghurs.org
https://campaignforuyghurs.org/
Washington, D.C. – Campaign for Uyghurs (CFU) extends its heartfelt wishes to the global Muslim community as we begin the holy month of Ramadan and calls for urgent action to end the suffering of Uyghur Muslims under China’s ongoing genocide and war on Islam. Ramadan, observed by Muslims worldwide, is a sacred month of fasting, prayer, reflection, and donation. It is a time dedicated to spiritual devotion and self-discipline. For Uyghur Muslims, however, Ramadan has become a month of intensified persecution, surveillance, and suppression of their faith.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has forbidden Islamic practices among Uyghurs, branding any expression of faith as “religious extremism.” Fasting, a pillar of Islam, is now treated as a crime punishable by detention in the Uyghur region. In 2021, surveillance giant Hikvision won a $9 million contract for a system that automatically alerts administrators if students are “suspected of fasting.” During Ramadan in 2025, reports from police officers indicated that Chinese officials ordered Uyghurs to submit daily video proof that they were not fasting. Additionally, some Uyghurs who traveled to the region last year confirmed that those who did not send this video proof, even if they simply forgot, were arrested and labeled as “Islamic extremists.”
“While Muslim communities worldwide welcome Ramadan with prayer and spiritual devotion, Uyghur Muslims face detention, enslavement in forced labor programs, and pervasive state monitoring,” said Rushan Abbas, Executive Director of CFU. “This is a part of the full-fledged active genocide designed to sever the Uyghur connection to Islam and replace it with communist ideology. This Ramadan, the global Muslim community and all defenders of human rights must stand together and take concrete action to end the Uyghur genocide, as no one can claim ignorance of the atrocities against the Uyghurs and China’s assault on Islam.”
The targeting of Uyghurs during Ramadan is part of the CCP’s broader genocidal policy. Uyghur children are being forcibly transferred to state-run boarding schools and separated from their parents, a direct violation of Article II(e) of the Genocide Convention, which prohibits “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.” The CCP works to “sinicize Islam” and rewrite the Quran, systematically destroying the religious, cultural, and linguistic foundations of Uyghur life. CFU urges governments, human rights organizations, and the global Muslim community to take immediate action to amplify Uyghur voices, boycott products linked to Uyghur forced labor, pressure governments to hold China accountable, and support organizations working to end the genocide.
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