Hong Kong slams human rights group Amnesty International over ‘groundless’ claims Uygur student missing for more than 2 weeks since arriving in city
- Hong Kong government strongly condemns Amnesty International over claims Abuduwaili Abudureheman went missing after arriving at city’s airport
- Official records shows he neither entered nor been refused entry, government says, adding Amnesty must apologise for ‘slandering’ local human rights situation
Hong Kong authorities have slammed a leading human rights group for making “groundless” accusations that a Uygur student has gone missing after arriving at the city’s airport, saying the person in question had “not entered or been refused entry”.
The statement on Saturday night came a day after Amnesty International urged officials to reveal the whereabouts of Abuduwaili Abudureheman, who texted a friend that he had been interrogated by “Chinese police” after arriving at the airport from Seoul on May 10.
The government said it strongly condemned the NGO’s “groundless and unfounded remarks”, characterising the accusations as an attempt to smear authorities.
Official records showed Abudureheman had neither entered nor been refused entry to the city, it added, demanding an apology from Amnesty International.
“The organisation deliberately attacked the [Hong Kong] government and slandered the human rights situation in Hong Kong without checking the facts. Its malicious intentions are obvious,” the government said.
Local authorities did not respond to the Post’s questions regarding whether the man was sent to mainland China or had been detained at the airport.
Responding to the government’s statement, Amnesty said it remained concerned for Abudureheman’s safety as he was still missing, adding that the friend had been unable to contact him.
A day earlier, the organisation said Abudureheman had not been contactable since he sent a text message to the friend on May 10 after landing in the city from Seoul, where he was studying for a PhD.
“Abudureheman said he was being interrogated by Chinese police after arriving at Hong Kong airport,” it said.
Abudureheman travelled to the city to visit the friend, who had gone public with the disappearance of the Uygur man after becoming increasingly concerned for his safety.
“The Hong Kong authorities must urgently reveal the whereabouts of Abuduwaili Abudureheman, who has not made contact with loved ones for more than two weeks and is at grave risk of torture based on his ethnicity and religion,” said Alkan Akad, the organisation’s China researcher.
“If he is detained, he must be provided with access to a lawyer and relatives, and protected against any ill-treatment. Unless there is sufficient and concrete evidence pointing to an internationally recognisable crime, Abuduwaili Abudureheman must be immediately released.”
Akad added that the man’s “unknown fate” was “deeply worrying”, citing what he said were records of the mainland’s actions against Uygurs in Xinjiang and the authorities’ “ongoing pursuit” of members of the ethnic minority who had travelled overseas.
“That [Abudureheman] appears to have been detained on arrival and interrogated raises questions about the potential complicity of the Hong Kong government in human rights violations being committed against Uygurs by the Chinese government,” Akad argued.
Amnesty said it understood Abuduwaili was on a Chinese government “watch list” of Uygurs and other Muslims from the Xinjiang region, based on the fact he had a history of overseas travel.
It claimed it had documented other instances of the Chinese government targeting Uygurs both at home and abroad.
