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In the summer of 2021, a Uyghur woman named Zeynure was at her home in Istanbul when she got a long-awaited 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 Casablanca. The lack of communication had been torturous.

But the information her husband Idris shared was more alarming. He explained that upon arrival in Morocco, he had been taken into custody and imprisoned. Authorities informed him he would be deported to China. "Reach out to anyone who can assist me," he pleaded, before the line went silent.

Life as Ethnic Minority in Exile

The wife, in her early thirties, and Idris, in his late thirties, are part of the mostly Muslim community, which makes up about 50% of the population in China's western Xinjiang province. Over the last ten years, more than a 1,000,000 Uyghurs are estimated to have been detained in so-called "vocational training camps," where they faced torture for commonplace actions like attending a place of worship or using a hijab.

The pair had been among many of Uyghurs who escaped to Turkey during the 2010s. They believed they would find refuge in their new home, but soon found they were wrong.

"I was told that the Beijing officials threatened to close all its industrial plants in the nation if Morocco released him," Zeynure said.

After settling in Istanbul, Zeynure became an language instructor, while Idris started as a interpreter and artist, assisting to publish Uyghur news and printed works. They had a family of three kids and felt free to practice as followers of Islam.

But when one of Idris's best friends, who was employed in a book repository containing Uyghur books, was detained in the mid-year of 2021, Idris panicked. Reports indicated that Beijing was pressuring Turkey to deport Uyghurs. Idris felt at risk due to his prior detention, which he suspected was connected to his work with advocates and supporting Uyghur culture. He chose to escape to Morocco, but Zeynure, whose Chinese passport had expired, had to stay behind with the children until her husband could apply for a travel document for the whole family.

A Terrible Mistake

Leaving Turkey turned out to be a terrible mistake. At the Istanbul airport, immigration officials took Idris aside for questioning. "After he was eventually permitted to board 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 confirmed when he was removed from the plane and arrested by border officials.

Over the last ten years, China has been utilizing 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 aware he would be arrested upon arrival in Morocco.

What happened next would lead her to do what many Uyghurs fear most: defy China, regardless of the risks.

Family Pressure

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

Her parents had a chilling message. "They told me, 'We know your husband is not with you. Maybe we can help you,'" she stated. "I realized there must be some police there with them and just acted 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 life at risk, the quiet-mannered Zeynure was not going to remain silent. She had grown up seeing women having their head coverings forcibly removed in open by the police and had been determined to live in a country with religious freedom.

"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 these platforms. But I had to do something to rescue my husband – I had to reveal the reality to the international community. Everyone knows Uyghurs deported to China will be tortured or die. They forced me to raise my voice."

Growing Up in Xinjiang

Zeynure has two distinct types of recollections of her early years in Xinjiang. The first was of blissful days spent in the rural areas with her grandparents, who were farmers. "I'd play with the animals and poultry. I don't know if I will ever have that kind of chance again. The family around the home and farm. It was too beautiful, like a scene from a story."

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

China claims it is tackling extremism through 'controlling illegal religious activities' and 'vocational education facilities', but other countries, including the US, say its actions amount to genocide. Zeynure says she never felt able to practice her religious beliefs in Xinjiang. "People who went on pilgrimage to Mecca abroad were arrested and transferred to jail and told they must have some issue in their brain.

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

She eventually decided to depart China after coming back home from university in another part of China to a growing repression on beliefs in 2011. It was then that she was introduced to Idris by one of her classmates. "She was aware we both had made the decision to go overseas and told us perhaps we could get together and go as a group."

Zeynure says she was right away comforted by Idris. "I realized he was very honest and reserved, and couldn't tell lies or do anything wrong. There were some Uyghur boys at university who wanted to marry me, but Idris was unique."

Fresh Start in Turkey

Within two months they were wed and ready to leave for a new life in Turkey. They knew it was an Islamic country with many believers and Uyghurs already living there, with a comparable language and common background. "It was like Uyghurs' alternative homeland," says Zeynure. As a educator and designer, they could also help the Uyghur population in exile. "We have many kids now in China growing up without Uyghur traditions or language so we think it's our responsibility 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 prominent force in targeting dissidents abroad through the use of monitoring, intimidation 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 will, including detaining and extraditing Uyghurs it wants to silence.

Fighting for Freedom

After the call from Idris, and learning he had an Interpol alert against him, Zeynure knew she only had a short window of chance to try to stop his deportation to China. She immediately reached out to as many Uyghur support groups as she could find advertised online in the EU and the US and begged for help. She was brave despite China having already shown a willingness to go after the family members of other individuals.

Zeynure started protesting with her children at the diplomatic mission in Istanbul, and sharing information on online platforms. To her amazement, copycat protests soon followed in Morocco demanding Idris's release. Moroccan officials were forced to issue a announcement saying his extradition was a matter for the courts to determine.

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