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In the summer of 2021, a Uyghur woman named Zeynure was at her residence in Istanbul when she answered a long-awaited phone call from her husband. There had been four agonizing days since their last communication, when he was preparing to board a flight to Morocco. The lack of communication had been difficult.

But the update her husband Idris shared was even worse. He informed her that upon landing in Morocco, he had been arrested and imprisoned. Authorities informed him he would be sent back to China. "Call everyone who can help me," he pleaded, before the line went dead.

Existence as Uyghurs in Turkey

Zeynure, in her early thirties, and Idris, in his late thirties, are members of the mostly Muslim ethnic group, which makes up about 50% of the residents in China's western Xinjiang region. Over the last ten years, more than a 1,000,000 Uyghurs are estimated to have been imprisoned in alleged "vocational training camps," where they faced abuse for commonplace acts like going to a place of worship or using a hijab.

The couple had joined thousands of Uyghurs who fled to Turkey during the 2010s. They believed they would find safety in their new home, but soon discovered they were mistaken.

"Authorities informed me that the Beijing officials threatened to close all its industrial plants in the country if Morocco freed him," she stated.

After moving in Istanbul, Zeynure worked as an language instructor, while Idris started as a interpreter and designer, helping to publish Uyghur news and publications. They had three children and enjoyed able to live as Muslims.

But when one of Idris's best friends, who worked in a book repository stocking Uyghur books, was arrested in the summer of 2021, Idris became fearful. News indicated that Beijing was pressuring Turkey to extradite Uyghurs. Idris felt at risk due to his prior detention, which he suspected was connected to his work with advocates and supporting Uyghur heritage. He decided to flee to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had lapsed, had to stay behind with the children until her husband could request a travel document for the family.

A Terrible Error

Departing Turkey turned out to be a terrible decision. At the Istanbul airport, immigration officials pulled him aside for interrogation. "When he was eventually permitted to board the plane, he told me how happy he was that they had let him go, but it felt like a trap to me," Zeynure said. Her worst fears were realized when he was removed from the plane and detained by border officials.

Over the last ten years, China has been using the global police agency Interpol to pursue political refugees and had asked for Idris to be added on the agency's high-priority "alert list." Zeynure says Turkish officials let him take the flight aware he would be apprehended upon landing in Morocco.

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

Parental Pressure

Soon after hearing of her husband's detention, Zeynure got an unexpected phone call from her family in Xinjiang. She had been separated from her family since they came to see her in Turkey in 2016 and were imprisoned for a few months upon their return to China.

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

But with her husband's life at risk, the softly spoken Zeynure was not going to stay quiet. She had been raised witnessing women having their head coverings ripped off in public by the authorities and had been resolved 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 caring for my family; I didn't even have Facebook or Twitter. But I had to do something to save my husband – I had to tell the reality to the international community. Everyone knows Uyghurs sent to China will be tortured or die. They forced me to raise my voice."

Childhood in Xinjiang

Zeynure has different types of memories of her childhood in Xinjiang. The first was of blissful days spent in the rural areas with her elders, who were agricultural workers. "I'd play with the animals and chickens. I don't know if I will ever have that type of chance again. The relatives around the home and land. It was too wonderful, like a picture from a book."

The second was as a religious minority in Xinjiang, of school holidays cut short by mandatory teachings of "communist songs" and being prohibited from attending the mosque or practicing Ramadan.

China says it is addressing extremism through 'managing unauthorized religious activities' and 'training centers', but other countries, including the US, say its actions amount to genocide. Zeynure says she never felt able to practice her religious beliefs in Xinjiang. "People who went on religious journey to Mecca in Saudi Arabia were detained and transferred to jail and told they must have some problem in their brain.

"They wanted Uyghur people to forget their faith and heritage. They said 'you should believe in us, we provided you jobs and this good life here'," says Zeynure.

She eventually decided to leave China after coming back home from university in another part of China to a increasing repression on religious freedoms in 2011. It was then that she was connected to Idris by one of her school friends. "She was aware we both had made the choice to go overseas and told us perhaps we could get together and go as a group."

Zeynure says she was right away comforted by Idris. "I realized he was very honest and shy, and couldn't be dishonest or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to marry me, but Idris was different."

Fresh Start in Turkey

Within two months they were wed and prepared to leave for a different existence in Turkey. They knew it was an Muslim-majority country with many believers 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 help the Uyghur population in diaspora. "We have many children now in China growing up without Uyghur culture or dialect so we think it's our duty to not let it disappear," she says.

But their relief at locating a place of safety overseas was short-lived. Beijing has become a prominent force in pursuing dissidents abroad through the use of monitoring, threats and physical assault. But what Idris was subjected to was a more recent method of repression: using China's increasing financial influence to force other countries to yield to its demands, including arresting and extraditing Uyghurs it wants to silence.

Campaigning for Release

After the phone call from Idris, and discovering he had an Interpol alert hanging over him, Zeynure knew she only had a limited time of chance to try to prevent his deportation to China. She immediately reached out to as many Uyghur support groups as she could find listed online in Europe and the US and begged for help. She was fearless despite China having already shown a willingness to go after the family members of other targets.

Zeynure started demonstrating with her children at the diplomatic mission in Istanbul, and posting updates on social media. To her surprise, copycat protests soon followed in Morocco demanding Idris's release. Moroccan officials were forced to put out a statement saying his deportation was a matter for the judicial system to determine.

In the start of August 2021, Interpol withdrew Idris's alert after being urged to reexamine his case by human rights groups. But that did not prevent a Moroccan court later deciding he should still be sent back to China. Zeynure says there was significant political influence from Beijing, which made {little sense|