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Vote Could Oust Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu; Third And Final Day Of G7; Queen Elizabeth And The American Presidents; Uyghurs Deported From The Middle East. Aired 5-6a ET

Aired June 13, 2021 - 05:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


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CYRIL VANIER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): This hour on CNN NEWSROOM, President Biden is set to wrap his first G7 summit, telling world leaders that the U.S. is back. And next, a royal reception.

Thank you for joining us. I'm Cyril Vanier. We're live in Cornwall, England, where G7 leaders are holding their final day.

ROBYN CURNOW, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): I'm Robyn Curnow here at CNN World Headquarters.

Also coming up this hour, a crucial vote expected today in Israel. We're live in Jerusalem with that.

Also, the heartbreaking stories of Uyghur families torn apart by unexplained deportations from the Middle East to China.

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VANIER: Welcome, everyone, to our little spot on the Cornish coast in the southwestern corner of England. This is the stage that Boris Johnson has set to welcome the leaders of the world's richest democracies.

The G7 summit is going to wrap up today with day three, the final day, two working sessions today. These are the leaders in the world's wealthiest and most powerful democracies.

The session just now beginning is titled "Open Societies and Economies." And the last session is tackling the issues of climate change. The new U.S. President Joe Biden has made a good impression on the other leaders. Take a listen to French president Emmanuel Macron.

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EMMANUEL MACRON, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE: And I think it's great to have a U.S. President part of us and very willing to cooperate.

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The United States, I've said before, we are back. The U.S. is back and we feel very, very strongly about the cohesion of NATO and, I, for one, think that the European Union is an incredibly strong and vibrant entity.

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VANIER: CNN international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson joins us from the summit site.

Nic, the communique landing in a few hours, after, of course, these sessions. The devil will be in the details.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: It is; one of the details about vaccinating the world to help stop the pandemic. We know the leaders here will commit between them expected 1 billion doses of vaccine. Boris Johnson said he believes that the target should be everyone on the planet should be vaccinated by the end of 2022.

The World Health Organization said that 1 billion doses is not enough. They said they need 11 billion. Critics said we need to see a finance package announced by the leaders here to encourage more investment by the pharmaceutical companies, to ramp up production and take their hands off of some of the intellectual property rights and see some development of vaccine production sites on continents like Africa.

So will there be detail on that and will a billion doses stand up to scrutiny?

We just heard the British foreign secretary saying a billion doses of vaccine goes a long way to achieving that goal of having everyone vaccinated by the end of 2022. He said without it, the vaccinations, the whole planet, would not happen until the end of 2024.

When you hear an answer like that to a question about the finance structures that they just described, it seems to be that we're not going to get that in the final communique.

Let's look at what was said substantially about how they're going to build back better, greener, reduce carbon emissions, reduce that target to 1.5 degrees centigrade. As you say, it will be in the detail and we'll know in a couple hours.

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VANIER: Nic Robertson, thank you, for the readers' guide. And a little later on, you'll be giving us the "Reader's Digest." Thank you, Nic.

The G7 summit is only part of the first trip abroad as president. There is a lot on his plate this week. After the summit, he will meet with Queen Elizabeth at Windsor Castle. Then he will travel to Brussels for the NATO summit.

On Tuesday he will meet with E.U. on leaders. On Wednesday, he will meet with Russia's Vladimir Putin in Geneva. It will be the first time he sits down with the Russian leader since taking office in January. Let's turn now to CNN's Melissa Bell.

And, Melissa, this feels a lot, both the G7, what is happening here, and what will happen in your neck on the woods, NATO, it feels a lot like the "I'm not Donald Trump" tour and the mending fences tour.

MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It does not room division. On the contrary, in many ways it exposes divisions we'd forgotten about. Over the last four years when these conversations were possible, much has changed.

So on the agenda for Joe Biden when he arrives tomorrow, there will be a focus on China and Russia. China more important to the United States, Russia more crucial in terms of strategic interests and defense to Europe.

They will also be talking about, as ever, the financial contribution. Jens Stoltenberg pointing out that, for seven years now, the spending of European countries and Canada has increased even though he acknowledges there is further to go.

Then there is for the first time ever, a question of climate change. Not just that it is fueling conflict in so many parts of the world but also in terms of how military emissions can be controlled to try to do what they can for climate change.

So it will be an interesting reset of relations.

VANIER: European leaders haven't made any progress in their vision that the French president put together for a common European defense. You could argue that they have little choice but to fall back in line behind the U.S. president.

BELL: Well, I think that is what the French are trying to resist by recasting their narrative. A European common defense initiative would be better funded and more cohesive but not a threat. This will also strengthen NATO.

The idea of a strengthened defense system is a good one but not the kind of strength that Jens Stoltenberg is hoping they will be talking about in this looking ahead to the 2030 and the NATO agenda.

VANIER: They will be aligned with Joe Biden as far as Russia is concerned. Europe pretty much on the same page when it comes to handling Vladimir Putin, Russia, Russian aggression. And when Biden sits down at the table with Putin, he will have or he should have a position of strength, knowing his allies are behind him on that one.

BELL: We'll be hearing more about discord on the subjects both when Biden meets with NATO allies and E.U. partners as he goes into that meeting. You're right. I think it will be an important context for a situation that one would dearly love to hear live.

We already it will include issues like Ukraine, Navalny, these are things Biden said he will be raising in Geneva. It will be interesting to see out of that what comes in terms of a reset of their relations, which has been fairly publicly and verbally more confrontational than peace so far.

VANIER: Melissa Bell, thank you very much.

CNN's Clarissa Ward spoke with British prime minister Boris Johnson on the sidelines. He dropped a few bombshells in that interview.

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VANIER: He lashed out and said that Putin has done, quote, "unconscionable things."

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CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: President Biden will be meeting with President Putin.

BORIS JOHNSON, U.K. PRIME MINISTER: Yes.

WARD: President Biden famously said that he thought President Putin is a killer.

Do you believe President Putin is a killer?

JOHNSON: I certainly think that president Putin has done things that are unconscionable in the -- fairly certain that he authorized the poisonings in Salisbury that led to the death of an innocent member of the British public, the attempted poisoning of the Skripals.

You have seen what is happening to his leading opponent, Alexei Navalny, who is in prison on trumped up charges, and facing -- and is effectively being tortured.

And so I think that what Joe Biden will be doing when he goes to see Putin will be giving some pretty tough messages. And that's something that I wholly approve of and I did the same last time I saw Mr. Putin myself.

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VANIER: Stay with us, more world news for the final day of the G7 summit after this.

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VANIER: We pick up our coverage of the final day at the G7 meeting of the richest democracies in the world. Let's take a look at the big picture. Quentin Peel is an associate fellow with the European programme at Chatham House and a commentator for the "Financial Times" and he is joins us from London.

Has the new U.S. President just erased the last four years of foreign policy of Trump?

QUENTIN PEEL, ASSOCIATE FELLOW WITH THE EUROPEAN PROGRAMME, CHATHAM HOUSE: He certainly has been greeted with great enthusiasm. I think there is an enormous sense of relief among the other members of the G7 that it isn't Donald Trump who's there.

So I think, as far as Joe Biden's message of America is back is concerned, that is one that is greeted with great enthusiasm.

VANIER: We're -- so what are the limits on that?

Because it seems, first of all, that, really, the point of these few days, the overarching point is to show Western countries that the old alliances, that Team Democracy, that the West are all aligned on the big topics. But each country is going to push their national agenda, which makes sense and is to be expected.

PEEL: Yes, I think that actually what we have seen after the last couple of days is quite a lot of mixed messages. It has not been very clear. They wanted, I think, to come away from this, showing a great sense of new Western unity. And it is not entirely there.

One of the problem areas is clearly China. I think, on China, Joe Biden probably wants a tougher response from the G7 than many of the European countries are really prepared to give. They're much more equivocal about future relations with China.

The other problem about this G7 is actually related to Boris Johnson. He is very keen that Britain should be seen as the new go-to global intermediary, a great -- really, despite Brexit and leaving the European Union, Britain is very much there at the top table.

The trouble is his relations with the other Europeans have really been quite badly soured by the Brexit process. So, he, too, is having a bit of trouble, I think, getting his message across.

VANIER: So this was an opportunity for Boris Johnson to showcase his vision of global Britain, right?

As both an innovator and a global power whose voice matters.

Do you think that is working?

I'm thinking specifically of the pictures where the European leaders were having lunch or meeting on their side. You end up with the Joe Biden, the European leaders and Britain seems to be in a lane of its own.

PEEL: I agree. I think there is a real problem there for Johnson. He has actually really undermined the trust of his European partners, particularly on that question of how Brexit affects Northern Ireland. On that, Joe Biden seems to be much closer to the rest of the European Union than he is to Boris Johnson.

And that, I think, has really continued to, if you like, undermine Johnson's attempt to present this warm, fuzzy feeling of global Britain being a good guy at the table.

There is one classic picture that has come out from this, which is of Boris Johnson trying to give the elbow, to touch elbows, with Angela Merkel of Germany. And she is quite obviously not offering her elbow. (LAUGHTER)

VANIER: Yes, I saw that. It is amusing but also it just says something about power relations and you know -- and how different world leaders manage that. For Mr. Macron, clearly the physical touch is something that appears to be very important to him.

I mean, he was manhandling Boris Johnson at the beginning of the summit. He was very deliberately, almost awkwardly putting his arm around this man who's quite a bit taller than him.

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PEEL: Yes, it reminds you of that extraordinary time where Donald Trump refused to shake hands with Angela Merkel. So in a way, she is turning the same gesture around. But now it is Boris Johnson on the receiving end. And I think that is a real problem for Johnson. The question is trust.

Has he got the trust of Joe Biden?

Joe Biden is passionate about protecting the peace process in Ireland. And no one can accuse Joe Biden of trying to undermine the peace process. If he says to Boris Johnson, mind your language, make peace, make sure you don't undermine this process, then I think Johnson has to listen.

VANIER: Yes, absolutely. And it is still early days. I think we have to point out in fairness for the U.K., outside of the European Union on the global stage, Boris Johnson and the U.K. will undoubtedly find their feet but they have been part of a powerful commercial bloc before of 28 voices. And now they're not.

They're faced with the world superpower, who has not always aligned with them. Quentin, thank you so much for your time. Great speaking to you today.

With that, we're going to toss it back to Robyn in Atlanta at the CNN World Center, who has a packed show full of world news.

CURNOW: I do, indeed, thank you so much, Cyril.

This could be Benjamin Netanyahu's final hours as Israeli prime minister. That's if a new diverse coalition government gets the final go-ahead from a confidence vote in Israel's parliament, the Knesset. They are set to have right-wing leader Naftali Bennett as its prime minister. Elliott Gotkine joins me now from Jerusalem.

ELLIOTT GOTKINE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This all kicks off in about 3.5 hours for what will be a mini marathon sessions of the Israeli parliament here. This could be the last days, as you say, of Benjamin Netanyahu's reign. Today could be the day that he is leaving office.

There is quite a lot to get through. We're going to hear from Naftali Bennett, who is part one of this proposed coalition. We'll hear from other parties as well. And they'll have a speaker. And then the main event will start. The new speaker will go around to every single member and lawmaker in alphabetical order, asking if they're with the government, if they're for or if they're against it.

And if they get a simple majority, then the new government will be sworn in. And if they don't, then we're almost back to square one. There will be three weeks to try to set up another prime minister. New elections are still a possibility.

But since they have decided to stick together since they got together, they will get this vote over the line. But it's not over until it's over. But only until the vote is done and the new government is sworn in will Netanyahu's reign be over, at least for now.

CURNOW: So if everything goes according to the coalition's plan, Mr. Netanyahu is out as prime minister.

What's his next move?

And based on his previous political legacy, I'm assuming he will not go quietly.

GOTKINE: No one expects him to go quietly. He will be the leader of the opposition and a tricky opposition as the biggest party in parliament. No doubt he will try to do what he has failed to do, is undermine this coalition to the extent that it collapses.

Perhaps we could see legislation but really kind of focusing on some of the ideological splits. It is the first time a party represents Arab residents as well. So the hard bit, getting this coalition over the line, the next bit will continue. And Netanyahu will do everything he can to undermine it.

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CURNOW: Thank you so much, Elliott Gotkine there in Jerusalem.

Rescue teams in China are looking for survivors after a gas explosion in Hubei province on Sunday morning. At least 12 people are dead, many are still trapped. Officials say 150 people have been rescued, including 37 with serious injuries. I want to go now to Hong Kong. Kristie Lu Stout has some information.

KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. This massive gas explosion ripped through a residential area in the central Chinese province of Hubei earlier today and at least 12 people have died so far. They managed to locate about 150 people, including some that are described as being severely injured.

This took place this morning. Local officials say that many people remain trapped in the debris and in the rubble. There is quite a number of search personnel and sniffer dogs at the scene.

Now video of the aftermath of this devastating and deadly explosion has been circulating rapidly on Chinese social media. You see a neighborhood transformed, waking up in the morning and it is instantly transformed into this charred and unrecognizable wasteland. One resident on Weibo said, "I really can't imagine it. My home is

only 100 or 200 meters away from the explosion. I can't imagine that the place where I live day and night has become a ruin."

Now sadly, deadly explosions like this in China are not new and each time this happens it raises serious questions about safety standards in China. In January this year, one was killed at a factory explosion in Hunan.

And in August of last year, six people were killed in a chemical plant explosion. In 2015, over 100 people were killed in a blast, a series of chemical explosions. Back then China pledged to increase safety standards. But six years on we have this explosion and an investigation is underway -- Robyn.

CURNOW: Thanks so much, Kristie Lu Stout, for that update there, live in Hong Kong.

U.S. President Biden will soon take tea with Britain's Queen Elizabeth. We'll take a look at the special relationship between the monarch and a dozen American leaders.

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CURNOW: Welcome back, I'm Robyn Curnow, live in Atlanta with all of the latest world headlines.

The leaders of the most powerful democracies are in their third and final day of deliberations on a host of critical global issues. These nations don't always see eye to eye on solutions. But what they manage to agree on will be expressed in a final communique at the end of the summit.

The most obvious takeaway is the presence of Joe Biden as the U.S. President. Part of his mission has been to restore trust among America's most important and reliable allies.

When he meets Vladimir Putin next week in Geneva, he hopes to present a united front of democracies.

But at the top of the agenda today for the Bidens was attending Sunday mass at a local Catholic Church in Cornwall. And then they will go to Windsor Castle, where they will take tea with the queen. Her Majesty has met every sitting U.S. president during her reign except for one. Max Foster is already standing by for that.

Max, it is quite extraordinary that she has met 12 U.S. presidents.

MAX FOSTER, CNN LONDON CORRESPONDENT: Yes and Truman before that, when she was a princess as well. So you could argue 13. And Hoover as well, when he wasn't president. The point about the queen for many heads of state around the world is that she is the one that has been there and seen it over decades where they have only been in power for a number of years.

Getting that photo with the queen is really part of your career as a head of state these days. You want that photo, you want it on the mantelpiece. And President Biden will have that today. He will be welcomed here by a guard of honor.

They will go into the castle and have tea. We will never hear anything about that conversation because they are traditionally very private affairs, unless President Biden speaks about it afterwards like president Trump did last time. He revealed they discussed Brexit, which was seen as a faux pas. But in many ways, this visit will look very much like the last Trump visit.

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FOSTER (voice-over): The special relationship -- or a dozen special relationships.

RONALD REAGAN, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Ladies and gentlemen, to Her Majesty the Queen.

FOSTER (voice-over): Joe Biden is the 12th U.S. President to meet Queen Elizabeth II during her reign. The queen will have met every sitting president during her 69-year reign, except Lyndon B. Johnson.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip were welcomed at the White House by the first lady at the beginning of a memorable visit to the nation.

FOSTER (voice-over): Starting with Dwight Eisenhower in 1957 and, most recently, Donald Trump, Britain's monarch has seen her share of administrative change. And the conversations invariably remain private.

PRINCE EDWARD, EARL OF WESSEX: People really do respect the fact that this is a genuinely private, off the record conversation. So they really can talk about things and get to the heart of things in a very genuine fashion because they know it's not going to come out.

FOSTER: Does she ever let slip to you in any way?

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PRINCE EDWARD: Of course not. Of course not.

FOSTER (voice-over): Well-known for their shared love of horses, Elizabeth took president Ronald Reagan horseback riding in Windsor in 1982.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was not expected to happen.

FOSTER (voice-over): His successor, President George H. W. Bush, brought the queen to her first baseball game, at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, during a state visit, in 1991. Both, Reagan and Bush were later given honorary knighthoods, the U.K.'s highest distinction.

Opportunities to meet the 95-year-old monarch are dwindling. The queen no longer travels abroad. Leaders are expected to come to her. But when they do, the royal family rolls out the red carpet in a regal display of British soft power.

President George W. Bush was the first U.S. President to pay an official state visit in 2003. Bush was also the last to host the queen at the White House in 2007. Pomp and pageantry do, at times, provide awkward moments however, evident when president Trump visited in 2018.

He also revealed the topic of their conversation, Brexit, which raised eyebrows, too.

His predecessor, President Barack Obama, also committed a faux paw by speaking over the national anthem.

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... the vitality of the special relationship between our peoples.

FOSTER (voice-over): Now is the turn of Obama's V.P. and current commander in chief to visit Windsor Castle. President Biden will be welcomed by a guard of honor before being invited in for tea.

BONNIE GREER, AMERICAN-BRITISH PLAYWRIGHT AND AUTHOR: The future of the special relationship depends, ultimately, on the American people and the British people, what we understand about each other. And Joe Biden is of a generation where that special relationship means something. The queen is, certainly.

ELIZABETH II, QUEEN OF ENGLAND: To the continued friendship between our two nations and to the health, prosperity and happiness of the people of the United States.

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FOSTER: The focus on the traditions and protocols of these events. Ultimately the queen just wants the visitors to have a good time. They're not expected to bow. Actually this is the third time that Joe Biden has met the queen. They met the first time many years ago when he was a young senator and his mother, ahead of that meeting, said do not bow to the queen.

There is a big debate about whether or not he should.

Should he do as locals do or not bow because he is on the same status level and he is not a British subject, either.

CURNOW: I'm going to let them figure that one out. But good to see you, Max, and it looks like you might need a hat or some sunblock, it's some very warm weather there in the U.K. right now. FOSTER: Yes.

CURNOW: Enjoy the rest of your day.

An exclusive report just ahead. We're tracking what some say is the forced deportation of Uyghur Muslims from three major Arab countries back to China.

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CURNOW: Welcome back.

A Danish football star is recovering after a terrifying medical emergency. Christian Eriksen collapsed during a match between Denmark and Finland. Teammates and fans watched in shock and horror. The Danish Football Association says that Eriksen is still stable. A sports journalist at the match talks about how emotional the stadium was.

JONAS RYEFELT, SPORTS JOURNALIST: I was just trying to look somewhere else. And I kept finding people in tears, teammates, who couldn't be like in the ring around Christian Eriksen, just players sitting on the other pitch side.

And he couldn't be there, just took a knee and waited for something good to happen. It was horrifying.

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CURNOW: In China's Xinjiang region, up to 2 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities have been detained and continue to face what is being called a genocide. Beijing says the camps are merely vocational training centers for combating religious extremism.

Some Uyghurs have left but say even abroad they're not safe. A new Human Rights Watch reports says China has tracked down hundreds of Uyghurs across the globe.

A CNN investigation dives into Uyghur deportations from the Middle East, a stinging betrayal by predominantly Muslim countries. Jomana Karadsheh joins me now live from Istanbul.

This is extraordinary reporting that you and your team have done.

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, a few months ago our team came across the case of a Uyghur man, who was detained in Saudi Arabia, facing deportation back to China. And I must, you know, mention that he is still behind bars as we speak right now.

So we started looking into the issue and we found more and more cases of Uyghurs, saying they were forcibly returned to China. Our reporting this week came up during a U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee hearing on the persecution of Uyghurs, where Senator Tim Kaine the China director of Human Rights Watch what the U.S. should do about its allies, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, who were accuse of forcibly returning Uyghurs to China.

He said the United States should provide safe havens, provide places where they can safely apply for asylum. They say not a week goes by when they don't receive a phone call from somewhere around the world where Uyghurs are facing deportation back to China.

And as we found in our report, Robyn, Uyghurs feel their safe space is shrinking.

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KARADSHEH (voice-over): This quiet Uyghur protest outside Istanbul's infamous Saudi consulate is a race against time.

Nuriman's father's fate hangs in the balance.

"If he's sent back to China, he'll be imprisoned. And there's danger of death," she tells us.

Nuriman Veli says she and her sister lost contact with their mother in China's Xinjiang region four years ago.

"If, God forbid, we lose our father as well, it will destroy us," she says.

Her father, Hamdullah Abduweli, a Uyghur Muslim scholar, was nabbed by Saudi authorities in November while on a pilgrimage to Islam's holiest city.

Nuriman pleads, "Send him back to Turkey, where he's a resident, not China."

For her father, there is still time.

For others, there is little hope.

KARADSHEH: Activists say at least five Uyghurs have already been deported from Saudi Arabia.

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KARADSHEH: We spoke to two of those families who confirmed these deportations. This is just one part of what appears to be a terrifying campaign by China.

Over the course of our investigation, we have also found cases of Uyghurs forcibly returned to China from the United Arab Emirates and Egypt in violation of international law and where they may face what the U.S. has labeled a genocide. KARADSHEH (voice-over): Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt did not

respond to our request for comment. China's a major trade partner to these Muslim majority countries, who have not only turned a blind eye to China's treatment of Uyghurs, their autocratic governments have also voiced support for what China insists is a counterterrorism campaign.

Maryam Muhammad has been keeping a dark secret from her boys, trying to shield them from the cruel reality of the world they were born into, a nightmare that followed them thousands of kilometers from their homeland in Xinjiang.

She tells them, Daddy is away working. The last time she heard from her husband, Muhtar Rozi, he was being detained in Egypt on July 16th, 2017.

MARYAM MUHAMMAD, MUHTAR ROZI'S WIFE: He said, you are -- you are my -- my precious. I love you so much. And from that day, I did not get any message about him.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Maryam was living her dream. She and Muhtar studied in Cairo's Al Azhar University, got married and started a family. But when China's long arm reached Egypt, they scrambled to get out.

Maryam says she flew to Turkey with the boys and, with reports of arrests at the airport, Muhtar tried to get the ferry out to Jordan but was stopped.

There was little Maryam could do to try and find her husband. She wrote letters to U.N. agencies and governments but she says no one responded.

Muhtar's detention was never acknowledged. Like others, he just vanished without a trace.

Egyptian authorities, believed to be acting at the behest of the Chinese government, rounded up dozens, possibly hundreds of Uyghurs, many of them male students at Al Azhar. More than 20 were forcibly returned to China, according to human rights groups. The Chinese crackdown on Uyghurs had expanded far beyond its borders.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) 21 but it's not exact number. Maybe it will be more.

KARADSHEH: Abduweli Ayup is a Uyghur activist. He says he has documented at least 28 deportations by these Middle Eastern countries. But no one really knows how many Uyghurs may be behind bars in the region or how many have already been deported back to China.

Too often, family members fear that going public would only make things worse for their disappeared loved ones.

Amannisa Abdullah, He is my children's dad.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Amannisa Abdullah is tormented by devastating guilt.

Did she push too much?

Did she not do enough to try and save her husband?

She fears family in China will pay the price for her speaking out now. But she says silence is no longer an option.

ABDULLAH: In two years this kind of guilty feeling is always inside of me. And I am not able to sleep, not able to -- even like -- if I feel happy, I have no right to feeling happy. I have no right to smile. I'm living like this.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Her husband, Ahmad Talip, lived and worked in the UAE for 10 years. In February 2018, he was detained while picking up paperwork from a Dubai police station. It was two weeks from hell for a nine-month pregnant Amannisa and her son, chasing Ahmed as he was moved between police stations and jails.

ABDULLAH: I have fear, if I don't be hurry up, my husband will be deported. I'm really worried about him at that time. I feel extremely helpless and that there is no one can help me at that time.

KARADSHEH: So this is the document you got from court?

ABDULLAH: Yes.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): She says no one would even tell her what Ahmad was accused of, only that he was wanted by China.

This document Amannisa obtained from Dubai's public prosecution confirms the Chinese extradition request. It also states the prosecution decided to close the case because Chinese authorities failed to provide the required documents. But Ahmad was transferred to Abu Dhabi.

And a few days later, Amannisa was told he was sent back to China.

ABDULLAH: If my husband have any crime, he committed any crime, why they don't tell me? Why China don't tell me?

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ABDULLAH: One of the most difficult question in my life is, where is my dad?

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Eight-year-old Musa is left with photos and patchy childhood memories.

KARADSHEH: This was in Dubai?

MUSA, AHMAD TALIP'S SON: Yes. We're making a castle. But I cannot make a castle without my daddy.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Musa says he's lucky his little sister, Amina, never met her father. Like tens of thousands of Uyghurs, the family found sanctuary in

Turkey. But as the government forges closer ties with China, Uyghurs feel their safe space is shrinking. With nowhere left to turn, Amannisa says she once asked for directions to the sea.

MUHAMMAD: I say, I want to take my child. I want to sit there. Actually, what I want to do is I want to go inside because I don't know how to swim.

KARADSHEH (voice-over): Amannisa asks, is this world just not big enough for Uyghurs?

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KARADSHEH: And, Robyn, Human Rights Watch says that, in many cases, it is impossible to find out what has happened to Uyghurs who are forcibly returned to China. We reached out to the Chinese government for comment. They did not respond to our request for comment on our reporting.

But as you know, Beijing repeatedly denies allegations of human rights abuses targeting its Uyghur minority and accusations of genocide. The foreign minister recently calling these claims of genocide outrageous.

CURNOW: Powerful reporting there, Jomana Karadsheh in Istanbul.

You're watching CNN. We'll be right back.

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VANIER: Robyn, I was following your conversation with Jomana Karadsheh on the flight of Uyghurs before the break. And it was fascinating investigation. China and forced labor in Xinjiang and Uyghurs is absolutely something Joe Biden has put on the menu of this G7 summit.

I know you want to wrap your show but there are a last few pictures I wanted to show you. The summit was not all business and no play. In fact, down time has been built into the agenda and the schedules.

So let me show you the pictures. On Saturday, the British prime minister hosted a beachside barbecue. The leaders and their spouses mingled around the deck at Carbis Bay, where the summit is being held.

And they got together to take that extended family photo, which is always such a staple at these meetings. And then they were tried to a flyover by the Royal Air Force Red Arrows. One of the reasons this matters, Robyn, is just this informal shoulder rubbing, it can be -- has the potential to be the grease that oils the wheels of international diplomacy. That's why I wanted to show you that, Robyn.

CURNOW: Thanks so much, and absolutely, relationships matter. Cyril Vanier, thank you.

Thank you to all of you here for joining us. I'm Robyn Curnow. You're watching CNN.