An Australian man from China’s Muslim Uygur community was reunited with his family, including a three-year-old son he had never met, after Beijing agreed they could depart Xinjiang . Sadam Abudusalamu shared photographs of his family arriving at Sydney airport on Thursday, saying on Twitter: “I never thought this day would come.” He thanked Australia ’s Foreign Minister Marise Payne, human rights activists, and “everyone who worked so hard to reunite us”. In 2017, Chinese authorities banned Sadam’s wife Nadila Wumaier and son from leaving Xinjiang by confiscating their passports, in what became a high-profile human rights case in Australia. Sadam had come to Australia as a student over a decade ago, and married Nadila in Xinjiang in 2016. Their son Lufty was born in Xinjiang, and granted Australian citizenship in 2019, after Sadam urged the Australian government to help the family. Uygur who fled Xinjiang still monitored by Chinese authorities in New Zealand In February, after China’s deputy head of mission in Australia, Wang Xining, said on ABC Television that Sadam’s wife did not want to leave Xinjiang, Nadila posted a photograph to Twitter holding a sign saying, “I want to leave and be with my husband”. Payne said in July that the Australian embassy in Beijing had formally requested the Chinese authorities allow Nadila, a Chinese citizen, to leave. China has been criticised at the United Nations Human Rights Council by countries including Australia and the United States for the arbitrary detention and restrictions on freedom of movement of Uygur Muslims in Xinjiang. China has rejected the criticism. The family’s lawyer Michael Bradley confirmed to Reuters that three-year-old Lufty and his mother had arrived from China two weeks ago, and had flown to Sydney on Thursday after quarantining at a hotel in Brisbane. Big name brands using Uygur ‘forced labour’: Australia think tank Bradley, who was at the airport, said Sadam was overjoyed to see his wife, and meet his son. “We are just thrilled it has ended this way. It has been a long saga,” Bradley said. Sadam hoped more reunions would happen. “My dream is for all my fellow Uyghurs to be reunited with their families,” he said on Twitter.