David Tobin

lol

Authoritarian states operating with impunity to silence dissidents in UK, report finds China, Russia and Iran were the biggest perpetrators of transnational repression but several other countries are trying to silence dissidents.

It is tragic that the Joint Committee on Human Rights did not mention Uyghurs. They are a key target for transnational repression and receive almost no support.

news.sky.com/story/author...

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In June 2025, academics and civil society organisations met in London for an International Network for Critical China Studies workshop to analyse how to prevent transnational repression. Governments & NGOs have not paid enough attention to TNR and need to do much more to protect people's rights.

In my undergraduate classes, you have to do the reading before commenting. You also have to analyse evidence by asking, why is this person saying this? Who is their intended audience? What verifiable evidence do they have for their statements? Repeating what people say is not analysis.

We've added a fundamental new feature/direction today, in which we'll be sharing, translating, and automatically validating various internal documents: shahit.biz/eng/#internal

Princeton University Press has yet to apologise for using politicised language and state narratives (e.g., 多元一体) that justify the elimination of group identities that the CCP does not approve.

thediplomat.com/2025/07/prin...

A generous interpretation is that the CCP/CPC 'debate' used to be a squabble over whether to emphasise socialism in one country or an international movement. Now it's a manufactured distraction to attract people who can't read Chinese.

Xi Jinping's "people's war on terror" differed significantly. CCP docs outline how it uses mass mobilisation, more intense surveillance, and detention for pre-crimes 👇

sheffield.ac.uk/las/research...

CDT is hands-down one of the most important public resources available for trying to understand China

Securing China's Northwest Frontier Cambridge Core - Asian Studies - Securing China's Northwest Frontier

www.cambridge.org/core/books/s...

After a Chinese government sponsored tour, Princeton University Press uses explicitly political language to celebrate party-state policies that removed the Uyghur language from the education system. If you are interested in what 多元一体 means in practice, chapter 2 of my book covers this 👇

🧵: It’s worth unpacking how the lines that PUP draws almost verbatim from party-state propaganda— most notably about “telling the story” of Xinjiang, which echoes Xi’s call to “tell the China story well” — have very specific applications to task the denial of abuses against Uyghurs and other Muslims

‘Ironic Points of Light’ — acts of redemption on the blank pages of history Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium Appendix XXV 贖   '... it’s like a child at the beach. You give them a shovel. They'll make a hole and a hill and work at it all day.

So much has changed since 1989 六四

chinaheritage.net/journal/iron...

10 small insights into Xinjiang camps and factories (2018-2019) A brief summary of takeaway points from a conversation between a former camp employee and a journalist, originally held off the record but now reproduced here in a very basic form.

We've published a short listicle of eyewitness points about camps and factories in 2018-2019, as delivered by an anonymous camp employee to a journalist during that period: blog.shahit.biz/2025/06/01/1...

Very short read, but insightful.

YouTube video by Mirshad Ghalip & David Tobin Echoes of Home Extended Preview

Was really privileged to see a screening of @drdavidtobin.bsky.social and Mirshad Ghalip’s “Echoes of Home” at this year’s AAS. Really excited to see that the trailer for it is getting a wide release. An excellent, funny, touching and thought provoking film.

YouTube video by Mirshad Ghalip & David Tobin Echoes of Home Extended Preview

Echoes of Home is my first film on Uyghur diaspora identities and football, co-produced with Dr Mirshad Ghalip.

"Each one of us has a story that goes beyond what our oppressors gave us".

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Naq1...

Mukaddas is a tremendous film maker but because she is Uyghur, unknown people (most likely Chinese authorities) are imitating her in a pathetic attempt to intimidate and collect information. Don't respond to this number and watch her films instead.

m.imdb.com/title/tt2782...

What has happened to me ~Testimony of an Uyghur ｗoman 3~｜清水ともみ What has happened to me ~Testimony of an Uyghur ｗoman 3~

What has happened to me ~Testimony of an Uyghur ｗoman 3~
note.com/tomomishimiz...

ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS! testimonies of Uyghur women, drawn by Japanese illustrator Tomomi Shimizu
清水ともみ 2025年4月10日

2 points from intro Chinese politics courses:

1. "National humiliation" was not remembered. It was taught to this generation (see Zhao Suisheng & William Callahan).

2. #China is not a passive victim. It has agency and deeply influences international relations.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Collective Study (Issue 03): CCP Youth Work, Settler Colonialism and Ethnic Assimilation

Unity Camps, Great Country Borderlands & Pomegranate Seed Families: How the CCP’s youth work promotes Xi’s assimilationist agenda, settler colonialism, and seeks to transform children into ‘little envoys’, ‘propagandists’ and ‘demonstrators’ of CCP-led ‘ethnic unity’.

Rednote, rankings, and rumoured riches: The real lives of Sheffield's Chinese Students We get behind the simplistic stereotypes

"Remember you’ll always be a f***ing Yanhuang son,” “Your skin is yellow.”

Perfect example of why the conversation on "anti-Asian racism" needs to include people who actually experience and work on racism in Asia.

www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk/rednote-rank...

Xinjiang active prisons - Google My Maps Locations of all active prisons in Xinjiang, as of 2025.

(for general use)

Here is the comprehensive map of all 58 prisons (监狱) currently active in Xinjiang today: google.com/maps/d/embed...

This should be all of them, barring any that might have been just constructed, in the past year or so.

I worked at Ningbo where reading lists are directly censored and electronic surveillance is in the classroom. It offers zero capacity to address issues of human rights or to promote understanding between two different countries.

More than 100 researchers and politicians have signed the statement in support of our colleague, Dilnur Reyhan, and against transnational repression.

Dilnur Reyhan, sociologist & president of Uyghur Institute of Europe, protested against the CCP at the Fête de L'Humanité in 2022 in an act of non-violent civil disobedience. Following a complaint from the Chinese Embassy, tomorrow she is taken to court.

www.lemonde.fr/idees/articl...

A group of Irish Uyghurs and Hong Kongers wave flags and banners in protest at the Chinese foreign minister's visit to Ireland on February 17th, 2025. Listen to our latest podcast at www.pwneilo.com or by searching for Perspectives with Neilo wherever you get your podcasts.

@irishuyghurca.bsky.social @iccl.bsky.social @irishtimes.com

Hear about the Irish Uyghur community and their concerns for safety.

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Decolonial Documentation: Homeland, Survival and Belonging in Kazakh and Uyghur Filmmaking The Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) is perhaps best known today as western China’s site of the largest mass internment of an ethno-religious group since WWII. Since 2018, the Chinese governme...

Three #documentary films 📽️ by #RemoteXuar team members were screened last month at the film festival #Decolonial Documentation: Homeland, Survival and Belonging in #Kazakh and #Uyghur Filmmaking at @uoft.bsky.social ⬇️

www.cinema.utoronto.ca/events/decol...

Think tankers in the US talking to think tankers in China is not a solution to multipolar international insecurity.