Model's rare video highlights plight of Uighur Muslims in China

A video of a31-year-old male modelMerden Ghappar first shared by BBC, gives a rare glimpse inside internment of the Uighur Muslims in China.

In the video, Ghappar, a modelfor the massive Chinese online retailer Taobao, can be seen handcuffed to themetal frame of the bed. It alsoreveals his dirty clothes, his swollen ankles.

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He juxtaposes his present miserable condition to the past when he was well paid to flaunt his good looks in slick promotional videos for clothing brands.

Ghapparexplicates howUighurs are still being detained in significant numbers, held without charge and being dragged into inChina's highly secure and secretive detention system.

The video sheds light on the"three evil forces" of separatism, terrorism, and extremism in the country's far western region of Xinjiang.

Ghappar's family shared the video along a photographwhich calls on children as young as 13 to "repent and surrender" to expose thepsychological pressure placed on Uighur communities.

They met him five months ago, but lost touch with him after his phone was confiscated by the detention authorities. Despite being aware thataware that the release of the four minute, thirty-eight second video of him in his cell might increase the pressure and punishment he faces, his family released the video to highlight his plight along with the Uighur Muslims in general.

Xinjiang's capital, Urumqi,home to 3.5 million people, has reporteda new wave of coronavirus cases.

China's ruling Communist Party is under growing international pressure over the fate of minorities in its northwestern region of Xinjiang.

More than one million ethnic Uighurs and other minorities, mostly Muslim Turkic peoples, have been herded into internment camps where they undergo political indoctrination, according to rights groups and experts.

Chinese health authority said Wednesday that it received reports of 27 new confirmed COVID-19 cases on the Chinese mainland Tuesday, including 22 locally-transmitted ones.

All locally-transmitted cases were reported inXinjiangUygur Autonomous Region, the National Health Commission said in its daily report.