[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 137 (Monday, September 17, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1889]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  THE PERSECUTION OF THE UYGHUR PEOPLE AND THE FAMILY OF REBIYA KADEER

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                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                       Monday, September 17, 2007

  Mr. WOLF. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of H. Res. 497, 
which expresses the sense of the House of Representatives that Rebiya 
Kadeer's children should be immediately released from detention, and 
that the Chinese Government should refrain from further persecution of 
the Uyghur people. I am proud to be a cosponsor of this resolution and 
believe strongly that the Chinese government must be pressed on these 
points.
  The China of today is not progressing, Madam Speaker, it is 
regressing. It is becoming more violent, more repressive, and more 
resistant to basic values of human rights and religious freedom. The 
Chinese government tortures and imprisons Catholic bishops, Protestant 
church leaders, Muslim worshipers, Falun Gong followers, and Buddhist 
monks and nuns just because of their faith and systematically destroys 
churches and confiscates Bibles. It persecutes the Uyghur people, 
cutting them off from the outside world as it pursues a policy of 
cultural liquidation.
  Rebiya Kadeer is a brave soul who has stood up to this violence and 
repression. She has suffered so much at the hands of the Chinese 
Government, and yet does not recoil in fear. For her bravery, the 
Chinese Government has retaliated by capturing and imprisoning her 
children who remained behind in China. They have been held at unknown 
locations, interrogated, and very possibly tortured.
  A couple of years ago, the FBI identified Chinese secret police 
following Rebiya Kadeer and spying on her at her Fairfax home. The 
Chinese Government will stop at nothing to silence those who oppose its 
brutal tactics against its own citizens.
  I urge the House to adopt this resolution, and to demand that the 
Chinese Government cease its persecution of the Uyghur people and 
immediately release Rebiya Kadeer's children from detention.

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