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In July 2021, Zeynure Hasan was at her residence in Turkey's largest city when she got a desperately anticipated phone call from her husband. It had been four stressful days since their last communication, when he was getting ready to take a flight to Morocco. The lack of communication had been unbearable.

But the news her husband Idris shared was more alarming. He told her that upon landing in Morocco, he had been detained and imprisoned. Authorities stated he would be extradited to China. "Reach out to everyone who can help me," he said, before the line went silent.

Existence as Ethnic Minority in Exile

The wife, 31 years old, and Idris, in his late thirties, are part of the mostly Muslim community, which constitutes about 50% of the residents in China's north-western Xinjiang region. Over the last ten years, over a million Uyghurs are believed to have been detained in so-called "vocational training camps," where they faced torture for ordinary actions like going to a mosque or wearing a hijab.

The pair had been among thousands of Uyghurs who escaped to Turkey during the previous decade. They hoped they would find security in exile, but quickly found they were wrong.

"I was told that the Chinese government threatened to close all its factories in the nation if Morocco released him," she explained.

After settling in Istanbul, Zeynure worked as an language instructor, while Idris began as a translator and artist, assisting to produce Uyghur media and publications. They had three children and enjoyed able to live as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's close friends, who was employed in a library stocking Uyghur books, was detained in the mid-year of 2021, Idris panicked. Reports indicated that Beijing was urging Turkey to extradite Uyghurs. Idris felt at risk due to his previous arrest, which he suspected was connected to his work with advocates and promoting Uyghur culture. He chose to flee to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had lapsed, had to remain with the children until her husband could request a travel document for the whole family.

A Terrible Mistake

Departing Turkey turned out to be a terrible decision. At the Istanbul airport, immigration officials pulled him aside for interrogation. "After he was eventually allowed to get on the plane, he told me how happy he was that they had let him go, but it felt like a set-up to me," Zeynure recalled. Her deepest concerns were confirmed when he was removed from the plane and arrested by border officials.

Over the past decade, China has been utilizing the global police agency Interpol to target political refugees and had asked for Idris to be placed on the agency's high-priority "red notice list." Zeynure claims Turkish officials allowed him board the flight aware he would be arrested upon arrival in Morocco.

What happened next would lead her to do what many Uyghurs dread most: challenge China, despite the consequences.

Parental Interference

Soon after learning of her husband's detention, Zeynure received an unexpected phone call from her family in Xinjiang. She had been cut off from her relatives since they visited her in Turkey in 2016 and were imprisoned for a few months upon their going back to China.

Her parents had a disturbing warning. "They told me, 'We know your husband is not with you. Perhaps we can assist you,'" she stated. "I knew there must be some police there with them and just pretended 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. 'Avoid saying anything negative about China.'"

But with her husband's safety at stake, the quiet-mannered Zeynure was not going to remain silent. She had been raised witnessing women having their hijabs ripped off in public by the authorities and had been determined to live in a country with freedom of belief.

"Before 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 world. Everyone knows Uyghurs sent to China will be abused or die. They pushed me to raise my voice."

Growing Up in Xinjiang

Zeynure has two distinct types of recollections of her childhood in Xinjiang. The first was of blissful days spent in the countryside with her elders, who were farmers. "I used to play with the animals and poultry. I don't know if I will ever have that type of chance again. The relatives around the house and farm. It was too wonderful, like a scene from a story."

The second was as a Muslim Uyghur in Xinjiang, of vacations interrupted by forced teachings of "communist songs" and being prohibited from attending the mosque or observing Ramadan.

China claims it is addressing radicalism through 'managing unauthorized religious activities' and 'training facilities', but other countries, including the US, say its actions constitute genocide. Zeynure says she never felt able to follow her faith in Xinjiang. "Individuals who went on religious journey to Mecca abroad were arrested and sent to prison and told they must have some issue in their mind.

"They aimed for Uyghur people to abandon their religion and culture. They said 'you should believe in us, we provided you jobs and this beautiful living here'," says Zeynure.

She eventually decided to leave China after returning home from university in Eastern China to a increasing repression on religious freedoms in 2011. It was then that she was connected to Idris by one of her classmates. "She was aware we both had taken the choice to go overseas and told us maybe we could get together and go together."

Zeynure says she was immediately comforted by Idris. "I saw he was very truthful and reserved, and couldn't be dishonest or do anything bad. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to marry me, but Idris was different."

A New Life in Turkey

Within 60 days they were wed and prepared to move for a different existence in Turkey. They knew it was an Islamic country with many Muslims and Uyghurs already residing there, with a similar language and shared ethnicity. "It was like Uyghurs' alternative homeland," says Zeynure. As a educator and creative, they could also help the community in exile. "There are many children now in China growing up without Uyghur culture or language so we think it's our duty to not let it disappear," she says.

But their sense of safety at locating a place of safety overseas was temporary. Beijing has become a global leader in pursuing critics abroad through the use of electronic surveillance, intimidation and violence. But what Idris was faced was a more recent method of control: using China's growing financial influence to force other countries to yield to its demands, including detaining and deporting Uyghurs it wants to silence.

Campaigning for Release

After the phone call from Idris, and learning he had an Interpol alert hanging over him, Zeynure knew she only had a limited time of opportunity to try to stop his extradition to China. She right away reached out to as many Uyghur support groups as she could find listed online in the EU and the US and begged for help. She was brave despite China having already shown a readiness to target the relatives of other individuals.

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

In early August 2021, Interpol cancelled Idris's alert after being urged to review his case by advocacy organizations. But that did not stop a Moroccan court later deciding he should still be sent back to China. Zeynure says there was huge political influence from Beijing, which made {little sense|