PRESS RELEASE – For Immediate Release
East Turkistan Government in Exile (ETGE)
East-Turkistan.Net
contact@East-Turkistan.Net
2 July 2025
The East Turkistan Government in Exile (ETGE) strongly condemns the Türkiye–China Media Forum held in Ankara on July 2, 2025. Hosted by Türkiye’s Directorate of Communications, the forum celebrated Beijing and called for intensified media and strategic cooperation, while deliberately ignoring the Chinese government’s ongoing genocide against Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in Occupied East Turkistan.
This silence is not diplomacy. It is complicity.
By aligning its media infrastructure with that of the Chinese Communist Party, the same regime responsible for mass internment, forced labor, systematic sterilization, religious persecution, and the ongoing eradication of Uyghur and other Turkic peoples in Occupied East Turkistan, the AKP regime in Türkiye is not acting as a neutral partner. It is actively enabling China’s campaign to conceal its crimes and destroy an entire nation. This so-called media cooperation is not about dialogue or diplomacy. It is about legitimizing genocide denial and helping Beijing expand authoritarian information control far beyond its own illegally occupied territories.
Fahrettin Altun, Communications Director for the Turkish Presidency, spoke on global crises but made no mention of the Uyghur Genocide in Occupied East Turkistan. This calculated omission speaks volumes. It reflects the AKP regime’s willingness to trade justice for geopolitical gain and its role in advancing the CCP’s narrative machine.
“By standing beside the Chinese regime and promoting joint media efforts, the Turkish government is helping China erase an entire nation,” said Dr. Jurat Obul, Minister for Communications and Information of the East Turkistan Government in Exile. “This so-called cooperation is nothing more than a platform for genocide denial. East Turkistan will not be silenced. We call on the Turkish people and the international community to resist this authoritarian partnership and stand for truth and justice.”
The ETGE warns that Türkiye’s alignment with China is not just a betrayal of Turkic solidarity, but a strategic threat to global democratic values and regional security. By strengthening ties with Beijing in media, security, and technology, the AKP regime is helping expand the Chinese Communist Party’s influence across Eurasia, undermining press freedom, civil society, and truth-based information ecosystems.
This growing Türkiye–China partnership is an example of how authoritarian regimes coordinate to suppress dissent and spread disinformation, often under the guise of “strategic cooperation” or “dialogue.”
The East Turkistan Government in Exile urges the international community to move beyond statements of concern and take meaningful action to counter China’s ongoing campaign of colonization, genocide, and occupation in East Turkistan. This includes rejecting partnerships that legitimize Beijing’s disinformation, and actively supporting efforts to expose and dismantle China’s global propaganda networks.
The people of East Turkistan cannot survive under Chinese occupation. Our very existence is at risk. Independence is not a dream — it is a necessity. We do not seek accommodation with tyranny; we seek the full restoration of our independence, freedom, and national dignity. Our right to sovereignty and self-determination is non-negotiable, and no empire, no matter how powerful, can erase our nation or extinguish our will to be free.
History will remember not just those who committed atrocities, but also those who chose to legitimize them.