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BEIJING - During US President Donald Trump’s first term, the United States led the way in pressuring China over its mass detention and surveillance of Uighurs. It imposed sanctions on Chinese officials, blocked some imports thought to be linked to forced labour, and, on Mr Trump’s last full day in office, officially declared China’s crackdown on the Uighurs a genocide.

Now, the Trump administration rarely mentions Uighurs, or Xinjiang, the far western region in China where the repression is occurring.

At this week’s summit in Beijing with Mr Trump and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, the systemic repression of the Uighurs is unlikely to appear on the agenda, which is expected to focus more on trade, the US-Israeli war with Iran and relations with Taiwan.

But some advocates are hopeful that Mr Trump will mention several high-profile Uighur political prisoners during his meetings with Mr Xi.

Many Uighurs in the diaspora – including the 12,000 or so estimated to be living in the United States – will be watching the summit closely for any sign that the Trump administration is still willing to press the issue.

“The attention on the Uighurs has been fading,” said Mr Yalkun Uluyol, a China researcher for Human Rights Watch, whose father has been detained in China since around 2018. “Especially now under Trump, we have seen a decrease in overall attention to human rights.”

The United States still formally designates the situation in Xinjiang a genocide, though the nature of the crackdown has changed over the years.