A symbolically important building in Xinjiang’s capital that was instrumental in the emergence of Uyghur entrepreneurs and businesspeople in the 1990s has been demolished, Radio Free Asia has learned. Authorities destroyed the Rebiya Kadeer Trade Center in Urumqi on Nov. 29, said Zumret Dawut, a Uyghur internment camp survivor now in the United States, citing sources from inside China’s far-western region of Xinjiang. The building had been shuttered for 15 years.
Other sources in Xinjiang, including police officers and a tourism worker, confirmed the demolition, and satellite photos show debris where the building once stood on a corner of downtown Urumqi, near the Grand Bazaar.