16 February 2026
Press Release – For Immediate Release
East Turkistan Government in Exile (ETGE)
East-Turkistan.Net
contact@East-Turkistan.Net
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The East Turkistan Government in Exile unequivocally condemns the appointment of Wang Gang as Beijing’s new top security chief in Occupied East Turkistan, serving as Secretary of the Political-Legal Affairs Commission. This elevation consolidates authority over the political-legal and security structures responsible for enforcing China’s ongoing genocide, crimes against humanity, and colonial occupation targeting the Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic peoples of East Turkistan.
The Political-Legal Affairs Commission serves as the occupation regime’s central command structure, directing colonial policing, judicial, intelligence, and security services. Its authority extends across mass detention, forced labor, surveillance, and coercive political control mechanisms underpinning Beijing’s genocidal policies in East Turkistan.
The Commission coordinates closely with intelligence bodies, including the Ministry of State Security and the United Front Work Department. This consolidation further institutionalizes transnational repression targeting East Turkistani exile communities through surveillance, infiltration, coercion, and intimidation of family members in violation of international law and the sovereignty of democratic states. These operations are designed to silence advocacy for accountability, decolonization, and national independence.
Wang Gang replaces Chen Mingguo, who was sanctioned in 2021 by the United States Department of the Treasury for serious human rights abuses in East Turkistan. His appointment, amid Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power across China’s military, political, and security leadership, reflects continuity and normalization of policies widely recognized by independent experts, governments, and legislative bodies as constituting genocide and crimes against humanity.
May 2026 marks twelve years since Beijing launched its so-called “Strike Hard Campaign Against Violent Terrorism,” an official policy framework under which mass internment, forced labor, demographic engineering, and systematic genocide and crimes against humanity have been institutionalized across Occupied East Turkistan.
Previously, Wang Gang held senior leadership roles overseeing the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps in Aksu, a paramilitary colonial entity central to land seizure, demographic engineering, and repression, as well as the State-Owned Assets Supervision Commission, which manages state enterprises implicated in detention and forced labor systems. These structures have been documented as embedded within mass internment and labor transfer programs targeting Uyghurs and other native Turkic peoples.
“Wang’s appointment underscores Beijing’s determination to further entrench and systematize its ongoing genocide and colonial occupation of East Turkistan,” said Dr. Mamtimin Ala, President of the East Turkistan Government in Exile.
On 22 January 2026, independent United Nations human rights experts warned that elements of state-imposed forced labor programs affecting Uyghur and other Turkic communities in Occupied East Turkistan may amount to enslavement and crimes against humanity.
“Governments must impose targeted sanctions on Wang Gang and other officials overseeing China’s campaign of colonization and genocide, and ensure accountability under international law,” said Salih Hudayar, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Security of the East Turkistan Government in Exile. “They must counter China’s transnational repression and uphold the East Turkistani people’s inherent right to decolonization, national self-determination, and independence.”
The ETGE calls upon the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, and other democratic governments to impose Global Magnitsky sanctions, strengthen enforcement against goods produced through forced labor, counter Chinese transnational repression and influence operations, and advance accountability mechanisms addressing genocide and crimes against humanity.
Governments must address the root causes of these atrocities by confronting China’s colonial occupation and supporting the East Turkistani people’s right to self-determination and restoration of national independence and sovereignty.
East Turkistan remains an occupied nation whose people retain the inherent and inalienable right to independence and full sovereignty under international law.