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In the summer of 2021, Zeynure Hasan was at her residence in Istanbul when she got a desperately anticipated phone call from her husband. There had been four agonizing days since their last communication, when he was preparing to board a flight to Casablanca. The silence had been torturous.

But the information her husband Idris revealed was more alarming. He explained that upon arrival in Morocco, he had been taken into custody and jailed. Authorities stated he would be sent back to China. "Contact anyone who can assist me," he said, before the line went silent.

Existence as Uyghurs in Turkey

The wife, in her early thirties, and Idris, in his late thirties, are part of the Uyghur community, which makes up about 50% of the residents in China's north-western Xinjiang region. Over the past decade, more than a million Uyghurs are estimated to have been detained in so-called "vocational training camps," where they faced mistreatment for ordinary actions like attending a mosque or wearing a hijab.

The pair had joined many of Uyghurs who fled to Turkey during the 2010s. They hoped they would find refuge in exile, but quickly realized they were wrong.

"I was told that the Beijing officials threatened to close all its industrial plants in the nation if Morocco released him," she said.

After moving in Istanbul, Zeynure worked as an English teacher, while Idris started as a translator and artist, assisting to produce Uyghur news and publications. They had three children and felt able to live as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's close friends, who worked in a book repository stocking Uyghur books, was detained in the summer of 2021, Idris panicked. Reports indicated that Beijing was urging Turkey to deport Uyghurs. Idris felt at risk due to his prior arrest, which he suspected was linked to his work with activists and promoting Uyghur culture. He chose to flee to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had expired, had to stay behind with the children until her husband could request a visa for the family.

A Terrible Error

Departing Turkey turned out to be a disastrous decision. At the airport, border control officials took Idris aside for interrogation. "When he was finally allowed to board the plane, he told me how happy he was that they had released him, but it felt like a set-up to me," Zeynure recalled. Her worst fears were confirmed when he was taken off the plane and arrested by border officials.

Over the last ten years, China has been utilizing the global police agency Interpol to pursue dissidents and had asked for Idris to be placed on the agency's high-priority "alert list." Zeynure claims Turkish officials allowed him take the flight aware he would be apprehended upon arrival in Morocco.

What followed would convince her to do what many Uyghurs fear most: challenge China, regardless of the risks.

Family Pressure

Soon after hearing of her husband's arrest, Zeynure received an unexpected phone call from her parents in Xinjiang. She had been separated from her family since they came to see her in Turkey in 2016 and were jailed for a few months upon their going back to China.

Her parents had a chilling warning. "They said, 'We know your husband is not with you. Perhaps we can help you,'" she stated. "I knew there must be some police there with them and just acted like I didn't know anything. But they insisted and told me not to do anything to help my husband. 'Avoid doing anything except feeding your children,' they told me. 'Don't say anything negative about China.'"

But with her husband's safety at stake, the softly spoken Zeynure was not going to stay quiet. She had grown up witnessing women having their head coverings ripped off in open by the police and had been determined to live in a country with freedom of belief.

"Prior to my husband was arrested in Morocco, I didn't do anything. I was just looking after my family; I didn't even have social media or Twitter. But I had to do something to save my husband – I had to tell the truth to the world. Everyone knows Uyghurs deported to China will be tortured or die. They pushed me to raise my voice."

Childhood in Xinjiang

Zeynure has different types of recollections of her early years in Xinjiang. The first was of happy days spent in the rural areas with her grandparents, who were agricultural workers. "I used to play with the sheep and chickens. I don't know if I will ever have that type of opportunity again. The relatives around the house and farm. It was too beautiful, like a picture from a story."

The second was as a Muslim Uyghur in Xinjiang, of vacations cut short by mandatory teachings of "communist songs" and being banned from attending the mosque or practicing Ramadan.

China claims it is addressing radicalism through 'managing illegal religious activities' and 'vocational education facilities', but other nations, including the US, say its actions amount to ethnic cleansing. Zeynure says she never felt free to practice her religious beliefs in Xinjiang. "Individuals who went on religious journey to Mecca abroad were arrested and transferred to prison and told they must have some problem in their mind.

"They wanted Uyghur people to forget their religion and heritage. They said 'you should trust in us, we gave you jobs and this beautiful life here'," says Zeynure.

She eventually decided to leave China after coming back home from college in Eastern China to a growing repression on beliefs in 2011. It was then that she was connected to Idris by one of her school friends. "She was aware we both had taken the decision to go overseas and told us maybe we could meet and go together."

Zeynure says she was immediately reassured by Idris. "I saw he was very truthful and shy, and couldn't be dishonest or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to wed me, but Idris was unique."

A New Life in Turkey

Within two months they were wed and prepared to leave for a new life in Turkey. They knew it was an Muslim-majority country with many Muslims and Uyghurs already residing there, with a comparable language and shared ethnicity. "It was like Uyghurs' second home," says Zeynure. As a educator and designer, they could also support the Uyghur population in exile. "There are many kids now in China being raised without Uyghur traditions or language so we think it's our duty to not let it die out," she says.

But their sense of safety at finding a place of safety overseas was temporary. Beijing has become a global leader in targeting critics living in exile through the use of monitoring, intimidation and violence. But what Idris was faced was a newer tool of repression: using China's growing financial influence to pressure other nations to bend to its demands, including detaining and extraditing Uyghurs it wants to suppress.

Fighting for Freedom

After the call from Idris, and learning he had an Interpol red notice against him, Zeynure knew she only had a limited time of opportunity to try to stop his extradition to China. She right away contacted as many Uyghur advocacy organizations as she could find listed on the internet in Europe and the US and begged for assistance. She was brave despite China having already shown a willingness to target the family members of other targets.

Zeynure started protesting with her children at the diplomatic mission in Istanbul, and posting updates on online platforms. To her surprise, copycat protests soon occurred in Morocco demanding Idris's release. Moroccan officials were compelled to put out a statement saying his extradition was a matter for the courts to decide.

In the start of August 2021, Interpol cancelled Idris's alert after being pressed to reexamine his case by advocacy organizations. But that did not stop a Moroccan court later ruling he should still be extradited to China. Zeynure says there was significant diplomatic pressure from Beijing, which made {little sense|