Confessions of a Xinjiang Camp Teacher

https://thediplomat.com/2020/08/confessions-of-a-xinjiang-camp-teacher/

“It was a huge camp,” she recalled. “There were about 10,000 women with shaved heads, of whom only about 60 were over 60. Most of them were young, pretty, well brought up.”

It was a camp for those who had studied abroad in Korea, Australia, Turkey, Egypt, Europe, or the United States. All highly educated and speaking several languages, they were detained on arrival in Xinjiang after returning to visit their families. Qelbinur suddenly feared for her own daughter, who was studying overseas. “I had decided to kill myself if China forced her to return,” she said.

Sanitary conditions at this camp were vile, Qelbinur recalled. The air reeked from a single toilet bucket in each cell that was emptied once a day. One minute was allowed for face washing in the morning and showers rationed to once a month.“The atmosphere was pestilential,” she said. “Many were getting sick from the lack of hygiene.”