Cambodian police hunting for two Uighur babies

The Cambodian police indicated on Tuesday that two Uighur babies named on the UNHCR list are currently being hunted.

Maymuna Abdukadir, a baby boy who was born on 28 June 2009, measuring 60 cm long and weighting 8 kg, and Bilal Abdukadir, a baby boy who was born on 14 June 2009, measuring 80 cm long and weighting 15 kg, were included on the UNHCR list of the 22 Uighur minorities. The babies are suspected of being spirited out by UNHCR agents.

The Uighur ethnic minorities from Western China arrived in Cambodia by crossing North Vietnam, and they entered Cambodia through the Bavet international border gate. The Uighur refugees were forced out of their various hiding places under gunpoint by Cambodian authority on Friday. One day later, i.e. on Saturday, 20 of the 22 asylum seekers, including a 6-month-pregnant woman, were put into a plane stationed in a military field under the cover of the night [and sent to China].

On Monday, Khieu Kanharith, spokesman for the Cambodian government, indicated, after the arrival of Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping and after the signing of the $1.2 billion loan from China, that: “China thanks the Cambodian government for helping deport these [Uighur] people back to China because, according to the Chinese law, they are criminals.”

Nevertheless, the government action received severe criticism from regional human rights organizations, as well as from the UN and the US.

Gordon Duguid, acting spokesman of the US State Department, warned that this incident will affect the relationships between Cambodia and the US, and it will also affect Cambodia’s international standing.

In spite of all these criticisms, the Cambodian government led by the former Khmer Rouge cadres does not seem to be much concerned about these criticisms at all. It should be reminded that under the Khmer Rouge leadership whereby Chairman Mao’s strategy of “digging out weeds, they must be completed uprooted,” not even newborn babies were ever spared. While we pray God to protect these Uighur babies, there is little hope that the lives of the Uighurs who were deported to communist China will be spared.