Uygur man who fled bloodshed in Xinjiang still faces harassment from Chinese authorities, 12,500km away in New Zealand

After bloody riots broke out 10 years ago, Shawudun Abdughupur left Xinjiang, hoping for a safer life in New Zealand

But as he struggles to make a new life in a foreign land, he continues to experience harassment from the Chinese authorities, including having his communications with his mother cut off

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Shawudun Abdughupur, an ethnic Uygur cameraman, left his homeland a decade ago. Photo: AFP

Published: 6:00am, 24 Jul 2019Updated: 6:00am, 24 Jul 2019

After brutal riots 10 years ago that left 200 people dead, Shawudun Abdughupur and his wife understood they could have no future in China’s Xinjiang region.

Then aged 33, the ethnic Uygur cameraman made a heart-wrenching choice to flee their homeland and strike out for a safer life 12,500km away in New Zealand.

“[After the riots] I found something is different,” he says, explaining the decision to leave. “I felt so hopeless.”

Shawudun Abdughupur has not heard from his mother since 2016. Photo: AFP

Relations between China’s Han majority and Abdughupur’s Muslim, Turkic-speaking brethren, have rarely been good.

Most of the current territory of Xinjiang was annexed by China in the late 19th century. Following the Chinese civil war and various armed struggles, the Communist army took control of the entire region in the early 1950s.