Demi with endangered species disappearing of a record levels can it be stumped both boards to likes one eye when a stint best to gates indonesias while bluff crossus on aljazeera in the found wished china them monstrous crying taking play region is now ship and still talking on me its what calorie it champ the story if hes space pasco story a train is efforts to cover hello im richard gives birth here watching a special edition of the listening toast it is not clear how many people are currently being held against their will by the state in the chinese province of sindh jack however conservative estimates put the number of ethnic week years and other muslim minorities held under some form of detention since 2017 at between one and 1500000 the apparent goal of the authorities to assimilate aggressively the minority wigger population with the much surety han chinese bay jane calls this its response to the threat of the quote 3 evils extremism terrorism and separatism the tools at the states disposal a combination of word of mouth informer base to survey allowance and the latest technologies facial recognition voice pattern sequencing d. N. A. Profiling along with some good Old Fashioned propaganda beijing and the Media Outlets it controls dont call them internment camps or prisons there are centers for reeducation or even thought transformation foreign Media Outlets are mostly lucked out of the prophets or of seen their sources dry op or disappear getting an accurate informative story out of there is not easy later in this program will look at the effect that we good journalists in the diaspora and internet sleuths outside of china have had on the News Coverage but 1st the listening posts i mean ox you ravi with a look at the shifting narratives and the occasionally orwellian language in the chinese news media in defense of the states policies and practices in sin jack. Just travel. International reporting of this story began slowly in 2017 journalists had already heard of surveillance in chinas shin jog region with body checks facial Recognition Technology and full monitoring. But there were whispers about other more disturbing developments people are really frightened of speaking out here with rebel for me to we go show willing to talk to us but were of this not to say were there are rumors of mass detentions of we go to stories of vast camps and of people vanishing for years the u. N. Said they had received credible reports of some 1000000 weekers beheld in internment camps the silence from the Chinese State was deafening initially it had nothing to say then came the denials including at the United Nations the argument that im in where worse i did hate the rage of hisn centers is completely untrue by late 2018 though the journalism had become more detailed 3 years ago the syria was just a patch of dirt today its a Detention Center measuring more than half a 1000000 square metres the reporting was much more difficult to refute and it forced a change in beijings messaging strategy. On oct 16th 2018 the Chinese State broadcaster c. C. T. V. Aired a 15 minute documentary about what they called Vocational Training centers in the needle. Poor. Function. Culturally that had for it told the story of what the Chinese Government wanted. Communicate about always happening in which was there was radical extremism there was terrorism there was. The government was fighting this as part of this worldwide battle against terrorism was how they framed it you had a number of pieces in nationalist publications like global times. Its all the sun you see both as chinese language media push not so much acknowledging that that there are weaker is who are in detention but kind of trying to spin it basically into something thats a softer more voluntary form of detention and then there was also a cultural aspect which is the idea that they are not you know stifling we are a culture they are preserving it. You know. Young. People are allowed to do ethnic dances make their traditional make their traditional rugs so their narrative has been changing over time based on how International Community has been responding reacting so this public Misinformation Campaign spots started last august and its happening to this day. Is weaker he advocates and campaigns for legal rights from his base in washington d. C. Took him has been to 16 the chinese official narrative i dont see john for years he and others are lists points to a framework of institutional islamophobia and a sense of superiority amongst the countries ethnic majority the one chinese they see this underlies the narrative of extremism culturally alienation and the need for the state to keep a lid on a potentially explosive situation in sin jug. Victor gao is on the other side of this debate hes a media commentator who frequently takes issue with western Media Coverage for under bombings by separatists through the ninetys and early 2000 as well as the riots. In 2009 when you reported. You need to report a threat which does exist. I think the Chinese Government has all along been consistent in expressing that there are concentration camps there are facilities and these facilities are mostly meant for education and training purposes. May or may far shipping jobs. And the western reports are fake news and misleading these are places where adults wear uniforms. But where they dont go home at the end of the day. But sleep up to 10 a roof top. Of the world the people in the world with fake news they call it the 3 forces of terrorism separatism and extremism. So they use that as kind of the face of what had happened before the Security Forces moved in in 2014 and made everything much safer there was an hour long documentary that was aired this past march and they go into 2009 a room she writes some of the past bombings that happened in the ninetys the interview the victims of those bombings they show the burned out buses dead bodies you know in the wreckage of a russian shes you shoot it and they keep kind of playing this footage over and over and you. Using that to justify this thousands of terrorist attacks number which we dont have any specific reference for the Chinese Government has been very fact. In its Misinformation Campaign it is still ongoing as we speak she didnt because government has shown 0 tolerance for political dissent it would be difficult for anyone to come out and express sympathy for any issue as sensitive as that we should for the past 3 years john has been administered by hardline officials who have intensified the campaign of propaganda imprisonments and socalled deed radicalisation this is come in the midst of one of the most stringent phases of National Government under the leadership of xi jinping we did question both the regional and National Government for interviews we got no response the latest numbers compiled by human rights campaigners showed that 52 meagre journalists have been locked up in. It isnt just we good media professionals though. Is a hunch chinese photographer he was picked up in a room she in november last year theres been no sign of him since numerous chinese journalists editors even academics have been swept up even when their work didnt actually take issue with chinese policy. Journalists are faced with dangers everywhere in the world many journalists are killed and if you report about. Faced with journalists. Trying to be objective i dont think journalists or international are faced with any other or more dangerous pressures compared with any other countries in the world one of the most dramatic examples is in one totti whos a professor from beijing who had a website publishing kind of every year and in chinese and essentially trying to bridge that gap to try to have actual real harmonious relations between the ethnicities and he was detained and sentenced to life in prison. Is a major story that is not exactly breaking news the camps what established 5 years ago in 2014 but over the past 3 years theyve grown larger taking in hundreds of thousands more readers and theyve become more secretive phone journalists have finally forced the chinese authorities to acknowledge the existence of the camps which is the start just about Everything Else about the story the people held there the truth of whats happening to them and the flow of information is under control. While the Chinese Media continue to take their orders from beijing on this story. Has been vital to International Coverage of sin jack radio free asia service is funded by the Us Government and it has a track record of breaking news on sin jack it was among. 1st to present facts and figures to back up the rumors of the socalled Vocational Training camps and it has since on earth dozens of stories on the crackdown informing foreign reporters and the we alike for our f. A. Wigger staff the sin jang story hits on comfortably and dangerously close to home many say they have had family members arrested aleem say tof is the director of radio free asia as weaker service he joins us now from washington mr say tough thanks for joining us the listening post today ever since day one on this story our f a weaker has led the pack breaking news on sin jang how did your organization 1st learn of this policy and the existence of these huge detention camps. In early to indias 17 we began to realize after interviewing chinese officials we go if usual as Police Officers and local residents that large numbers of wigglers have begun to disappear thans through our investigation by speaking to chinas official as we were able to confirm than in cosh car prefecture alone more than 120000 a week years ive been arbitrarily and ag tragedy usually detain in this camps than we began to Pay Attention to other as as well in the what down prefecture for example just the in one conti nearly 40 percent of the male Adult Population were taken to this camps gradually we are realize that chinas government or detaining large skill numbers of weaker is and other at thank indigenous population and a building this camps throughout the region covering this story from a such a distance cannot be easy what can you tell us about the methods you rely upon for your journalist where da have an obvious and china or we die have stringers there we did have sources that we used to a call and i were mouth that is primal a based upon the calling and targeted you know our areas regions police stations mosques streets etc sometimes takes a few days than we can a verify a certain things that have happened certain and if pensions 13 of and bath as in detentions so thats usually of the math that we use for many of your call a use your reporters this story is personal given that so many of them still have Family Living in the region what kind of personal blowback have vade been face china on see is radio free asia practically as an enemy is station an in particular of though weaker service because weaker service is one and a only independent weaker media in the world so chinas government targets were reporters. Chinese government has detaining. Parents loved ones and family members of almost all of our Staff Members 6 of them when public about the detentions and the others have been low key Chinese Government frequently pressure and the threaten their loved ones there telling them that they should convey the masses to the rebbe our reporters basically to quit their job or to provide information to the Chinese Government but this pressure and stress is the not distract from our work important work we are doing and actually that is. The reason that were doing more ever since day one since you launched in 1996 beijing has seen r. F. A. As a threat what do you say to your critics who see your reliance on u. S. Tax dollars for funding as having a compromising effect on your organization and the journalism it produces yes we do receive u. S. Tax dollar u. S. Funding but we are an independent and nonprofit Radio Station and we make our own editorial decisions independent of u. S. Government or other agencies so were not directly affiliated with the u. S. Government or its own agency is were completely independent our operation but that doesnt prevent the Chinese Government or other authoritarian governments in asia to label laws. As an arm of the u. S. Government or even cia but thats not the fact say tof thanks very much for speaking with us today my great pleasure. The chinese news media refused to cover the sin jang story until the reporting produced by International News outlets grew too compelling to ignore the aerial shots of specific camps the documents proving their ultimate purpose that material was 1st broadcast on radio and Television Networks outside of china but much of it was handed to those journalists on a plate by a handful of independent researchers practicing open source journalism relying on online tools ranging from Search Engines to satellite imagery those researchers have played a critical part in the reporting process and beijing is on to them its now doing a better job of covering its tracks online burying the evidence of its operations in sin jack the listening posts daniel tory now on to open source investigators and the role they have played in helping foreign journalists and the rest of the world understand the reality of sin janks caps. The most heavily surveilled probably of one of the most surveilled countries on earth. Most every movement is monitored whether you are a local or a journalist on assignment. The 1st thing you notice is the extreme level of Police Presence on every intersection on every block there is often a multistory Police Building there are security checks everywhere and if you know that there are also surveillance cameras on every Street Corner get it out with facial Recognition Technology and then you very quickly get a feel the sense of being surveilled of being watched wherever you are. According to a report by the Foreign Correspondents Club of china 9 in every 10 foreign journalists who travel to last year spoke of interference from the or fortys some with detained by Police Others forced to delete data on their phones and other devices. Most reporters 96 percent. Say they were visibly followed. And then there were the fog great dangers that face local sources. Last year journalist james palmer formerly based in china spoke about his personal experience trying to cover. All of my weaker sources of. Cash i dont talk to people because. I cannot reach them when we look at the lists of reasons theyve been given for people to be sent to concentration camps having had contact with foreigners is the single most dominant reason i have certainty of one of my sources being sent to a camp with the others i dont know whether they just cut off contact for their own safety or whether theyre actually imprisoned i stopped trying to reach weaker sources in the middle of last year because the risk to their