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In July 2021, Zeynure Hasan was at her residence in Istanbul when she received a desperately anticipated phone call from her husband. There had been four agonizing days since their last contact, when he was getting ready to take a flight to Morocco. The silence had been unbearable.

But the information her husband Idris revealed was more devastating. He explained that upon landing in Morocco, he had been arrested and imprisoned. Authorities stated he would be deported to China. "Reach out to everyone who can rescue me," he urged, before the line went silent.

Life as Ethnic Minority in Exile

The wife, in her early thirties, and Idris, in his late thirties, are members of the Uyghur community, which constitutes about 50% of the residents in China's western Xinjiang province. Over the last ten years, more than a 1,000,000 Uyghurs are estimated to have been imprisoned in so-called "re-education camps," where they faced abuse for ordinary actions like attending a mosque or using a headscarf.

The couple had been among thousands of Uyghurs who fled to Turkey during the 2010s. They believed they would find refuge in exile, but soon discovered they were mistaken.

"Authorities informed me that the Chinese government threatened to shut down all its industrial plants in the country if Morocco released him," Zeynure explained.

After moving in Istanbul, Zeynure worked as an English teacher, while Idris started as a interpreter and designer, helping to produce Uyghur media and printed works. They had three children and felt able to live as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's close friends, who was employed in a book repository stocking Uyghur books, was detained in the mid-year of 2021, Idris panicked. Reports indicated that Beijing was pressuring Turkey to extradite Uyghurs. Idris felt vulnerable due to his previous arrest, which he suspected was linked to his work with advocates and supporting Uyghur culture. He decided to flee to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had lapsed, had to stay behind with the children until her husband could apply for a travel document for the whole family.

A Costly Mistake

Leaving Turkey proved to be a terrible decision. At the airport, immigration officials pulled him aside for interrogation. "When he was finally allowed to get on the plane, he told me how happy he was that they had released him, but it felt like a set-up to me," Zeynure said. Her worst fears were realized when he was removed from the plane and arrested by border officials.

Over the past decade, China has been using the international police agency Interpol to pursue dissidents and had requested for Idris to be placed on the agency's high-priority "red notice list." Zeynure says Turkish officials allowed him board the flight knowing he would be apprehended upon arrival in Morocco.

What followed would convince her to do what many Uyghurs dread most: defy China, regardless of the risks.

Family Pressure

Shortly after hearing of her husband's detention, Zeynure received an surprising phone call from her family in Xinjiang. She had been separated from her relatives since they came to see her in Turkey in 2016 and were jailed for several months upon their going back to China.

Her parents had a disturbing warning. "They said, 'We know your husband is not with you. Maybe we can assist you,'" she explained. "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. 'Avoid doing anything except caring for your children,' they told me. 'Avoid saying anything bad about China.'"

But with her husband's safety at risk, the quiet-mannered Zeynure was not going to stay quiet. She had been raised seeing women having their hijabs ripped off in public by the police and had been determined 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 looking after my family; I didn't even have Facebook or Twitter. But I had to do something to save my husband – I had to reveal the reality to the international community. Everyone knows Uyghurs deported to China will be tortured or die. They pushed me to raise my voice."

Childhood in Xinjiang

Zeynure has two distinct types of memories of her childhood in Xinjiang. The first was of blissful days spent in the countryside with her elders, who were agricultural workers. "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 home and land. It was too wonderful, like a scene from a story."

The second was as a Muslim Uyghur in Xinjiang, of school holidays interrupted by mandatory teachings of "political anthems" and being prohibited from going to the mosque or practicing Ramadan.

China says it is addressing extremism through 'controlling illegal religious activities' and 'vocational education centers', but other countries, including the US, say its actions constitute ethnic cleansing. Zeynure says she never felt able to practice her faith in Xinjiang. "Individuals who went on religious journey to Mecca in Saudi Arabia were detained and sent to jail and told they must have some issue in their mind.

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

She finally decided to leave China after coming back home from college in another part of China to a increasing crackdown on beliefs in 2011. It was then that she was introduced to Idris by one of her school friends. "She knew we both had taken the decision to go abroad and told us perhaps we could meet and go as a group."

Zeynure says she was right away reassured by Idris. "I saw he was very honest and shy, and couldn't tell lies or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur men at university who wanted to wed me, but Idris was different."

Fresh Start in Turkey

Within two months they were married and prepared to move for a new life in Turkey. They knew it was an Muslim-majority country with many Muslims and Uyghurs already living there, with a similar tongue and common ethnicity. "It was like Uyghurs' alternative homeland," says Zeynure. As a educator and designer, they could also support the community in exile. "We have many kids now in China being raised without Uyghur traditions or dialect so we think it's our responsibility to not let it disappear," she says.

But their relief at locating a secure location abroad was short-lived. Beijing has become a prominent force in pursuing critics abroad through the use of monitoring, threats and violence. But what Idris was subjected to was a newer method of control: using China's growing financial influence to pressure other nations to yield to its demands, including detaining and deporting Uyghurs it wants to suppress.

Fighting for Release

After the phone call from Idris, and learning he had an Interpol alert hanging over him, Zeynure knew she only had a short window 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 on the internet in the EU and the US and begged for help. She was brave despite China having already shown a willingness to target the relatives of other individuals.

Zeynure started demonstrating with her children at the Moroccan embassy in Istanbul, and sharing updates on online platforms. To her amazement, similar protests soon occurred in Morocco calling for Idris's freedom. Moroccan officials were forced to issue a statement saying his deportation was a matter for the judicial system to determine.

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