The situation of the Uyghur minority in north-west China became even more precarious in 2013, says Henryk Szadziewski.
China's plan to transform the heart of Uyghur culture, learning and urban settlement - Kashgar old city - is well underway. The fact that the Uyghurs themselves have no voice in this process gives the experience a wider significance, says Henryk Szadziewski.
The growing bonds between central Asian states and China have a human-rights cost for Uyghurs across the region, says Henryk Szadziewski.
The violent protests of July 2009 in Urumchi revealed deep-rooted problems in Beijing’s policy towards the Uyghur people of Xinjiang region in China’s far west. The path to resolution can only be unblocked by acknowledging the Uyghurs’ right to speak, says Henryk Szadziewski.
The Chinese authorities’ continuing demolition of the urban heartland of Uyghur society is also the outward face of a deeper dispossession, says Henryk Szadziewski.
Anyone working on Uyghur human-rights concerns becomes used to a degree of surprise and unpredictability. I should have been ready, then, for the descent of the world's media
In the heart of Kashgar's old city, the bustle of central Asian life has not changed in centuries. In bright sunlight, the mud-brick buildings seemingly blend in with