China distances children from families to subdue Muslim west
By Associated Press
Sep 20, 2018 8:03 PM CDT
In this Aug. 24, 2018, photo, Abdurehim Imin, 42, father to 5 children and a poet and writer from Kashgar, China, works on an autobiography at his home in Istanbul, Turkey. He fled China in August 2013 and hasn't seen his children since then. In October 2015, his wife was arrested after he sent his...   (Associated Press)

ISTANBUL (AP) — As tens of thousands of Uighur families have been swept up in Chinese President Xi Jinping's campaign to subdue the sometimes restive Xinjiang, there is evidence that the children of detainees and exiles are being placed into dozens of childcare facilities across the far west region.

The measures, which experts say echo colonialist treatment of indigenous children in North America and Australia, come as around one million Uighurs and other Muslim minorities are held in internment camps that have alarmed a United Nations panel and the U.S. government.

The Associated Press interviewed 14 Uighur families living in Turkey and one Kazakh man in Almaty with a total of 56 children who remain in China. The families believe that among these kids, 14 are in state-run orphanages or boarding schools.

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