Gulshan Abbas added to Defending Freedoms Project List of Prisoners of Conscience

Retired Uyghur doctor Gulshan Abbas has been detained in Xinjiang, China, since 2018. We are thrilled to share that this week she was added to the list of Prisoners of Conscience as part of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission’s Defending Freedoms Project. We are so grateful to Rep. Ro Khanna for choosing to advocate on behalf of this peaceful, law-abiding grandmother, who has been unjustly targeted due to her sister’s activism against China’s oppression of the Uyghurs. With the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review of China coming up next week, this move is another important reminder of China’s abysmal human rights record. It will be an affront to Dr. Abbas and all those held #WithoutJustCause in China if the Council fails to hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable for its manifold human rights abuses. For now, we are heartened by the fact that Dr. Abbas has a designated congressional advocate who has joined the fight for her freedom.