Rahima Mahmut, Uyghur human rights activist, translator, and singer, addressed the 17th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy on February 18th, 2025.
Full Remarks:
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
It is an honor and privilege to be here with you today.
In 1989, I was one of thousands of students who travelled to Tiananmen Square, full of hope. As a petrochemical engineering student in Dalian, I took a 21-hour train ride in mid-May, joining hundreds from my university. The energy was electric—we believed we were part of something unstoppable.
But we were wrong. Warnings came: leave, or the army would clear the square by force. June 4th was the deadline. I left on June 2nd. Two days later, the massacre began. Thousands killed, many disappeared, mass arrests followed.
Back at university, we were ordered to write confessions. I hesitated, but teachers urged us to comply—they knew the CCP would punish not just us, but our families. So, like everyone else, I wrote: “I was confused. I’ll correct my political views and study hard to serve my country.”
A month later, passing through Beijing, I barely recognized it. Soldiers patrolled with guns. The spirit of the city was gone. Fear filled the air.
Beijing was never the same. And neither was I. Now I understood that the CCP would kill innocent young students.
I graduated and returned to my homeland, worked at a petrochemical plant in the industrial town of Maytagh. I got married and had a baby. The discrimination against Uyghurs was worsening. It got so bad that I left my job and started teaching Chemistry and English at a college.
During the winter break in 1997, I went to visit my family in Ghulja with my baby son. For months, the regime’s “Strike Hard” campaign had targeted religious clerics and imams, arresting hundreds. They had also banned Meshrep, a centuries-old Uyghur tradition that brought warmth and joy during the harsh winter.
On February 5th, one of the coldest days I can remember, hundreds of Uyghurs in Ghulja marched in protest. At my mother’s house, we waited, nervous—we knew the price of resistance. Then came the gunshots. The military opened fire, killing hundreds. That night, soldiers went door to door, dragging people away. Public trials followed, with many sentenced to execution. One of my neighbours was among them—his son was the same age as mine.
My beloved Ghulja was never the same again. And neither was I. Twice, I had seen the CCP murder its own people.
After winter break, I returned to teaching with a heavy heart. Often, I’d find a note on my desk: “There is someone in the class.” I soon realized a Han Chinese teacher was sitting among my students.
I was being watched. My life was at risk.
Then, in 1998, a Han colleague said, “Rahima, you are a free spirit. Why not go abroad?” His tone told me it was a warning.
So I did. Two years later, I left for the UK on a student visa.
Living in exile, my only comfort was speaking to my mother, siblings, and friends over the phone every weekend.
But with each passing day, things worsened. In 2009, the regime violently crushed another peaceful Uyghur protest, and used it as an excuse for extrajudicial arrests and killings, while installing surveillance cameras under the chilling slogan: “No Blind Spots!” It was the beginning of a police state.
In 2013, I was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer. My son was preparing for his A-level exams, and I was alone. My doctor urged me to have someone care for me during the harsh chemotherapy. My sister volunteered but CCP denied her a passport. I had to face the treatment on my own. Just after my surgery, I received the devastating news that my mother had passed away. I never got the chance to tell her I was sick.
That same year, Xi Jinping took power, and the terror escalated. In 2014, the authorities began profiling all Uyghurs—labeling us as normal, suspicious, or dangerous. When I learned of this, I felt a cold chill. I asked myself, what’s next? By mid-2016, mass arrests began, with people being secretly taken to concentration camps.
I called my family, but one by one, they stopped answering.
Then, in January 2017, I finally reached my eldest brother. But when he answered the phone, he didn’t greet me with “Assalamu Alaikum,” as we always did. I knew then that the rumors were true—the CCP has banned Muslim greetings.
“Are you okay?” I asked. “Why has no one been answering?”
“They did the right thing,” he replied quietly. “Please leave us in God’s hands. We leave you in God’s hands, too.”
It felt like another death. The same grief I had felt when my mother passed away, but this time, it wasn’t just my mother I had lost. The CCP had forced my family to cut me off.
Those first few months were incredibly hard, but I poured every ounce of my pain into activism.
I worked with journalists and researchers, translating testimonies, exposing evidence, and consulting on documentaries—including, Undercover: China’s Digital Gulag, which won a BAFTA and an Emmy. I became the UK Director of the World Uyghur Congress, founded Stop Uyghur Genocide, and worked to launch the Uyghur Tribunal for a genocide determination. We took the UK’s National Crime Agency to court for failing to act on Uyghur forced labour in cotton supply chains—and we won. I performed Uyghur music worldwide and composed songs using the words of imprisoned Uyghur writers.
In the past few years, we’ve heard less & less from inside. But I did learn that my eldest sister passed away. My brother, who dared to answer my call, was arrested, sent to three different camps, and only released because he was dying, and by a miracle, he survived. I have no news of the rest of my family.
Meanwhile, the CCP promotes tourism in my homeland, painting a false picture of normalcy. Beneath the staged performances and embroidered surfaces lies a brutal truth: millions are in camps or prisons, tortured and raped. Uyghur children are torn from their families, women sterilized, men worked to death in forced labour camps. Uyghur slave labour goods taint the entire global supply chain, while the CCP attempts to erase the Uyghur way of life.
But history has shown—no dictator can destroy a people as long as there is resistance and hope. We are fighting, but we cannot do it alone. We need the free world to stand with us.
Thank you.
17th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy, U.N. Opening, Monday, February 17, 2025
Key Quotes:
“Twice, I had seen the CCP murder its own people. I knew my life was at risk.”
“I poured every ounce of my pain into activism.”
“History has shown—no dictator can destroy a people as long as there is resistance and hope. We are fighting, but we cannot do it alone. We need the free world to stand with us.”
