Highly recommend the Xinjiang Data Project map. Look up the coordinates yourself. Google Maps will often be blurry/ outdated, but many ruins are visible. Two possibilities: ASPI is just making it up or genuinely believes the sites listed as accurate. 1/ https://xjdp.aspi.org.au/map/ ?

I know plenty will go with the former option, for whatever ideological reasons. This dataset is large, and I would not be surprised if somewhere within it there may be inconsistencies or mistakes. But consider why this may be when making your judgment. 2/

First, satellite data is often *all we have* for many of these sites: as researchers note in the reports linked in the map page, foreigners' access to these remote sites are highly restricted. Yet PRC law greatly restricts private geodata ventures. 3/

Second, those most likely to visit such sites are also those most likely to be detained. Only the most stringent of denialists will refuse to acknowledge the well attested fact that the more pious you appear, the greater risk you face in internment. 4/

PRC laws and regulations, after all, have an extensive history of repression of Islamic religious expression. One such example from 2013, from before mass internment, from Turpan (now deleted--I wonder why--but still archived) (my partial English trans.) https://web.archive.org/web/20180824132612/http://tlfs.xjkunlun.cn/xcgz/xcgz/2013/197779.htm

In other words, witness testimony that would confirm ASPI's findings would necessarily come from those who are likely already detained. Ask yourself: what do YOU think would happen to a Uyghur in Xinjiang who complained of mass internment, arbitrary arrest, etc.? 6/

It is indeed odd that so many expatriates and Kazakhs, Uzbeks, etc. have provided testimony substantiating the claims of researchers outside China. Yet the images CGTN show me are solely of happy, dancing Uyghurs! Weird. 7/

(intermission: badass) https://twitter.com/Nrg8000/status/1309166078505803782?s=20

Some more examples of repression of religious expression: explicit calls for "Sinification of religion" in Xinjiang legal pronouncements (again, my partial translation). CIA HACKS would call imposition of dominant cultural norms against a distinct minority imperialism. 8/

anyways this thread is meandering and I have work to do. It is frustrating to see people regularly write off witness testimony. Z*nz hates gays like me but the cool thing is I don't even have to use his research at this point. The evidence is all there. happy thursday. 9/9