Illustrated reporting: How Zumrat Dawut escaped from a camp in Xinjiang

By
Fabian Peltsch

On March 31, 2018, Zumrat Dawut is ordered to the police station in her hometown of Urumqi. At first, the young woman and mother of three thinks it’s just an identity check, as they now frequently happen in the Muslim-majority province of Xinjiang. But then everything happens very quickly: Zumrat is strapped into one of the notorious tiger chairs, a seating device equipped with iron snares from which there is no escape. She is interrogated for a day and a night, and is expected to testify about every phone call and every trip abroad. In between, the police beat her with clubs. It is the beginning of a martyrdom in a Chinese re-education camp, which ultimately ends two years later with Zumrat’s escape from China.