China in the 1980s, to her move to the United States in 1989, and her efforts to draw attention to the plight of Uyghurs in the face of mass internments and other grave abuses that the U.S. government says constitute genocide. Among those she’s spoken up for are her sister, Dr. Gulshan Abbas, who was imprisoned by China in 2018. Her father, Abbas Borhan, a prominent Uyghur scholar, was forced out of his job as chairman of the Science and Technology Council of Xinjiang because of his daughter’s activism.
Rushan Abbas currently serves as executive director of a human rights group, the U.S.-based Campaign for Uyghurs. She says her book, published by Optimum Publishing International, is intended both as a personal testimony and a political call to action for governments and citizens worldwide. She spoke to RFA Uyghur journalist Shahrezad Ghayrat. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
