How Power Reaches Uyghurs Beyond Borders
By Asiye Uyghur | The Netherlan
A recently published phone recording by Kashgar Times captures a conversation lasting more than twenty minutes between a Uyghur man living in Europe and a Uyghur official employed within the Chinese state system. The line remains steady throughout. No shouting. No overt intimidation. Not even an explicit threat. Yet the restraint is precisely what makes the call revealing.
Nothing in the conversation appears accidental. It does not resemble spontaneous personal outreach, nor does it function as a debate. Instead, it reflects a communication pattern reported repeatedly by Uyghurs living abroad — one whose purpose is not persuasion in the conventional sense, but the quiet regulation of boundaries: what may be said, which positions should be softened, and which forms of public presence ought to recede.
This is governance conducted at low volume.
Identity as a Precondition, Not a Bond
The call opens not with political discussion, but with familiarity. The official refers to shared memories, past connections, and a common Uyghur identity. The framing is deliberate. Before any topic is raised, the relationship is positioned as internal — an exchange among “one of us.”
Here, identity is not solidarity. It is a condition.
By foregrounding shared belonging, the conversation is subtly removed from the realm of power and placed into one of personal responsibility. Political disagreement is no longer disagreement with a state, but discomfort within a relationship.
The effect is not to invite dialogue. It narrows the space of refusal. Saying “no” becomes legible not as dissent, but as withdrawal — an act easily read as ingratitude, stubbornness, or moral failure. Authority does not need to assert itself; it is already present in the framing.
The Management of Reality
As the conversation progresses, the official turns to conditions in the Uyghur region. Reports of mass detention, coercive policies, and systematic persecution are not directly refuted with evidence. Instead, they are described as exaggerated, manipulated, or shaped by external agendas.
This is less an attempt to replace one account with another than an effort to place reality itself into doubt.
When events are recast as matters of perspective rather than fact, the question shifts. It is no longer whether abuses occurred, but whether speaking about them is worthwhile. Truth gives way to calculation. The focus moves from moral responsibility to personal cost.
In such a framework, silence requires no justification. Speech does.
Family as a Conditional Space
The most consequential moments of the call do not concern ideology or geopolitics. They concern family.
Parents are mentioned repeatedly. The possibility of reconnecting — of visiting home, of restoring contact — is introduced not as a guarantee, but as something that might be discussed. These references are never framed as threats. They are presented as openings.
Yet their logic is unmistakably conditional.
Certain choices may permit closeness. Others may prolong distance. Family appears not as a protected sphere, but as a negotiable one.
The response from the Uyghur man is direct. He explains that he chose to cut contact precisely to shield his family from pressure. There is no dramatization. He presents it as necessary.
That such a decision is intelligible at all speaks volumes. Where family safety depends on silence, the boundary between private life and political control has already collapsed.
Distance Without Exit
The call takes place while the individual is in Europe. Physical separation does not weaken the logic of the exchange. If anything, it clarifies it.
Governance here does not rely on territorial presence. It moves through language, memory, obligation, and kinship. It does not require explicit compliance. It requires restraint.
Under these conditions, safety ceases to be a status secured by law. It becomes an ongoing negotiation — maintained through caution, invisibility, and self-regulation.
For many Uyghurs abroad, this results not in dramatic confrontation but in gradual withdrawal: fewer interviews, fewer public statements, fewer appearances. The effect is cumulative — and largely invisible.
Pattern, Not Exception
Considered alone, this call could be misread as a personal initiative. Placed alongside the testimonies of countless Uyghurs living outside China, it becomes something else entirely.
The structure is familiar. The opening through shared identity. The dismissal of documented abuses. The pivot to family. The absence of direct threats. Consequence without articulation.
This is not repression as spectacle. It leaves no bruises, produces no headlines, and creates no singular incident to condemn. Its effectiveness lies precisely in its subtlety.
Silence, here, is not imposed. It is learned.
Conclusion: The Power of Quiet
The significance of this phone call does not rest on whether it succeeded in changing one person’s position. Its importance lies in what it reveals about a form of power that operates most effectively when it appears least forceful.
It does not demand loyalty or even agreement. It asks only for less presence, less speech, less visibility.
In such a system, calm cannot be mistaken for consent, nor quiet for safety. The absence of noise is not evidence of the absence of harm. On the contrary, it is often the condition that allows harm to persist unnoticed.
This is not governance by command. It is governance by atmosphere.
And it is precisely because it feels ordinary that it deserves attention.
Source:
Kashgar Times, “Chinese Officer Offers Uyghur a Way Out”
Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Uyghur News Network (UNN). Opinion pieces are published to encourage informed discussion on issues of public interest.
