Beijing’s suppression and persecution of its people, such as the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, has spilled over to Hong Kong in a drive to gain “ultimate control” of the city, human rights activists warn.

Slogans such as “Yesterday’s Xinjiang, today’s Hong Kong” had come to ring true since emerging in 2019 anti-extradition bill protests that later evolved into a wider social movement, said Dilshat Rishit, spokesperson for the World Uyghur Congress.

The activist said he believed that China’s persecution of predominantly Muslim Uyghurs in “reeducation camps” in the far western region of Xinjiang had extended to the southern city of Hong Kong. Beijing has strongly refuted claims that those are detention camps where inmates are brainwashed, instead saying the facilities are nothing more than education centers providing occupational training.

“The crisis that Hong Kong faces once again proves that the Chinese Communist Party has never fulfilled its external commitments,” Rishit said. He was referring to China’s promises to let Hong Kong people rule Hong Kong, and the principle of “one country, two systems” that guaranteed the city a high degree of autonomy.

China’s goal was to achieve “ultimate control” over Hong Kong, Rishit said. He saw that Beijing had tightened its hold on the city by using repressive methods to destroy the locals’ pursuit of freedom.

In January, the United States accused the Chinese of “genocide” and “crimes against humanity” over their treatment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang.

In response to the U.S. allegation, activist and Kazakh native Serikzhan Bilash said he had started to feel that Xinjiang was approaching “a repeat of the humanitarian crisis in Tibet,” and had helped Kazakhs in the region emigrate since 2017.

His activism in defending Kazakhs against Chinese repression attracted attention, and in 2019 Kazakhstan authorities put him under house arrest for “inciting ethnic hatred.” The activist was not released until he promised to stop leading political groups for seven years.

He later founded Atajurt Kazakh Human Rights to help ethnic Kazakhs in Xinjiang and to document incidents inside detention centers. The activist is now based in Texas in the U.S. and hopes to register the group as a nonprofit organization so it can raise funds and roll out large-scale activities to support Kazakhs in Xinjiang.

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