Financial Times - July 12, 2015
Lucy Hornby in Beijing and Piotr Zalewski in Istanbul
China
has accused Turkish diplomats of providing fake passports to members of
the Muslim Uighur minority attempting to flee overseas, saying they go
on to become “cannon fodder” for jihadi groups in Syria and Iraq.The accusations follow the forced repatriation to China of Uighurs from jungle camps in Thailand last week, which triggered violent protests in Turkey.Thailand returned 109 Uighurs
out of about 400 who were discovered last year in people smuggling
camps in its southern jungles, in their attempt to flee China for refuge
in Turkey. The week before, Turkey agreed to take 173 of the Uighurs,
many of them women and small children. Turkey
had been in protracted negotiations over the fate of the refugees, who
claimed to be Turkish when first discovered. Turkey’s foreign ministry
called the Thai government decision to send them back to China
“deplorable” and “in contravention of international humanitarian law”.
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