Where the River Dies: The Tragic Story of the Uyghurs in China

China’s repression of the Uyghurs dominated headlines in the late 2010s, with reports of a vast network of “reeducation” camps provoking condemnation around the world. But since then, coverage of this human tragedy and how it unfolded has been limited, especially as China sharpens its tools of mass censorship and control.

Drawing on years of reporting and research, New York Times journalist Dan Martin takes readers through Xinjiang’s rugged mountain ranges and across the Tarim River, to vibrant desert oases that are home to one of the world’s most repressed peoples. Contextualized within the larger geopolitical story of the rise of the Chinese Communist Party, the Global War on Terror, and the complicated thousand-year history of the Uyghur people, Where the River Dies tells the cruel story of a rich and resilient culture on the brink of demise.

Interwoven into this grand narrative are vivid stories of ordinary Uyghurs: a prominent economist imprisoned for voicing dissent; Uyghur families forced to host Chinese families assigned to monitor them; whole communities without young men. Even-handed in his treatment of a deeply complicated story, Martin is clear-eyed about both the brutality of the Chinese state and the violent responses of some Uyghurs, caught up in endless cycles of repression, humiliation, and retaliation.

What is happening in Xinjiang is not occurring in isolation, nor will its consequences remain quarantined there. Products made by Uyghur forced labor feed into global supply chains, and China is exporting high-tech surveillance systems similar to those prototyped in Xinjiang to governments around the world. Beautifully written and deeply tragic, Where the River Dies is both a crucial testimony and a warning.