Amnesty International Thailand published an article on the Thai government’s deportation of 40 Uyghurs to China on February 27, 2025, under the headline: Thailand: ‘Deportation’ of Uyghurs to China ‘unimaginably cruel’

The article states “Responding to reports that a group of about 40 Uyghurs who have been detained in Thailand since 2014 were today (February 27) deported to China, Amnesty International’s China Director Sarah Brooks said:”

“The forcible return of these men, or indeed any Uyghurs, to China would place them at risk of serious human rights violations. We urge the government of Thailand to clarify their status.

“Their ordeal is already chilling: they fled repression in China, only to find themselves arbitrarily detained in Thailand for more than a decade. The fact that they now may be forcibly returned to a country where Uyghur and other non-Han ethnic groups in Xinjiang have faced torture and ill-treatment, arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance is unimaginably cruel.

“The Thai government should have protected these men, but instead it has wilfully exposed them to these grave risks. In doing so, it has ignored pleas from Amnesty International and United Nations (UN) experts who urged it not to violate the internationally and domestically recognized principle of non-refoulement. And this just as Thailand has been elected to the UN Human Rights Council.

“We now call on the governments of Thailand and China to disclose the whereabouts of these individuals, and – if they continue to be in custody – to ensure that the full spectrum of their rights is respected, including their right to be free from torture and other forms of ill-treatment.

“Many of these men are in extremely poor health after enduring years in detention. They must have access to appropriate and adequate medical care. We call for an end to their ordeal, and urge authorities to uphold their right to freedom of movement. It is past time that they are allowed to safely rejoin their families.”

The individuals deported on February 27, 2025, are part of a group of approximately 300 Uyghurs who were detained by Thai authorities on March 13, 2014, after fleeing persecution and discrimination in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China.

In July 2015, 109 individuals from this group were deported to China.

Amnesty International has documented widespread and systematic human rights violations by the Chinese government against Uyghurs in Xinjiang, including the arbitrary detention of over a million people in “re-education” camps.

In its 2021 report, Amnesty stated that the Chinese government had committed crimes against humanity, at least in the form of arbitrary detention, torture, and persecution of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other Muslim ethnic groups in Xinjiang.

In a letter to the Thai government in January 2025, a group of UN experts reported that out of 48 detainees, 23 suffered from severe health conditions, including “diabetes, kidney dysfunction, lower-body paralysis, skin diseases, gastrointestinal disorders, and heart and lung problems.”

Thailand has obligations under the Non-Refoulement Principle, which prohibits the return of individuals under any circumstances if they face the risk of torture or other serious human rights violations.