Two Uyghur men in Thailand face deportation: 'I'd be like a slave' in China

Two more Uyghur men are staring down a one-way ticket to China from Thailand, and activists warn it could be fatal. Human rights groups say the pair were recently moved into an immigration detention centre, sparking fears that Bangkok is once again bowing to pressure from Beijing. One of the men told his girlfriend he would be "like a slave" if he were sent back.

The two had been serving seven-year sentences for offences tied to an attempted escape from immigration detention in January 2020. They belong to a group of more than 200 Uyghur men, women and children picked up by Thai police in 2014 near the Malaysian border after fleeing China. Since then, the women and children have been released to Turkey — while the men have been deported to China in batches, drawing condemnation from the UN and US secretary of state Marco Rubio.

"Previous Thai governments have kept Uyghurs in inhumane detention for years and then complied with Beijing's demands to send them to China, where they were forcibly disappeared," said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, who wants the men allowed to travel to a safe third country.

The girlfriend of one of the men, who goes by the Islamic alias Marzeyya Kasem, shared a letter he wrote to her in July. "Sometimes I thought why I'm a human being. What I do wrong against China … no want to go back to China," it read. The pair reportedly pleaded their case to Thailand's National Human Rights Commission on Wednesday.

Thailand's national security council chief, Chaipruak Doungprapat, told reporters the two men — plus three other Uyghurs still behind bars — have outstanding arrest warrants in China. It is unclear whether Beijing has filed a formal extradition request. Kasem isn't buying the warrants' credibility, noting her boyfriend was a minor when he left China. "If they are really wanted for a crime in China, why didn't China immediately issue a [Interpol] red notice [when they were detained in 2014]?" she asked, suggesting Thailand is hunting for a stronger legal footing after last year's mass deportation drew global backlash.

Uyghurs, a Turkic minority largely from China's Xinjiang region, have endured decades of discrimination, including the mass incarceration of hundreds of thousands in camps the UN has called a potential crime against humanity. Beijing insists its Xinjiang policies are about poverty alleviation and counter-terrorism. China's foreign ministry said its cooperation with Thailand on cross-border crime such as smuggling complies with both countries' laws and international practice, while Thailand's foreign ministry declined to comment.