What Next - What You Don’t See At The Olympics
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3.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2022
⏱️ 28 minutes
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Summary
As the Winter Olympics unfold in Beijing, a darker reality remains: China’s abuses against the Uyghurs, an ethnic minority in the country’s Xinjiang region. While much of the world remains glued to the sports coverage, Uyghurs in the diaspora are calling on people to pay attention to China's treatment of their family members back home.
Guest: Gulchehra Hoja, a Uyghur journalist with Radio Free Asia.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I called up Kul Chetra Hoja because I wanted her to translate this moment for me. |
| 0:11.2 | If you're watching the Olympics, you might remember it. |
| 0:13.8 | It was during the opening ceremonies. |
| 0:15.8 | And welcome back to this opening ceremony from Beijing, China. |
| 0:21.4 | As dancers whizzed around them, |
| 0:24.7 | two athletes appeared with the Olympic flame, |
| 0:27.9 | officially opening the games. |
| 0:30.0 | They were all smiles as they placed a tiny torch |
| 0:32.7 | in the center of a giant matrix of snowflakes. |
| 0:36.4 | Then fireworks erupted. |
| 0:42.3 | But the identity of one of these athletes, a downhill skier from the Xinjiang province, |
| 0:48.6 | alarmed some viewers. Because this skier, she's weaker, a member of a minority group that the U.S. says the Chinese government is trying to systematically eliminate. |
| 1:02.9 | Are you watching the Olympics? |
| 1:05.4 | No. Not at all. Even my kids rejected. |
| 1:11.1 | Gul Chetra, her friends call her ghoul, is weaker too. |
| 1:15.4 | This Olympic is about our dignity, you know. |
| 1:20.1 | So we reject to watch it. |
| 1:23.1 | Gould heard about this moment, of course. |
| 1:25.8 | Its trollishness seemed to strike her as almost funny. |
| 1:31.5 | It's a very natural reaction. We all sees that as a Chinese government using this girl to cover up to Uyghur genocide. |
| 1:42.0 | Do you worry that some people might see that and think it was a message of unity? |
| 1:48.5 | Like, everything's okay? |
... |
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