Ties that bind, documents that trap: transnational repression through abuse of consular services.
The burgeoning body of research on transnational repression examines how states exert control over their own emigrant citizens beyond national borders. In this discussion, a timely question warrants attention: how do states assert control through deliberate regulation of consular services on expatriate citizens and what impact does it create on them? Drawing on 27 in-depth interviews and extensive secondary-source analysis of cases involving transborder ethnic Uyghurs of Chinese nationality, the paper expands the study of transnational repression by theorising consular abuse – withholding, delay, and imposition of extraneous requirements – as an extraterritorial extension of state power. The analysis identifies how such abuse generates substantial costs on affected individuals in the domains of legal status, mobility, and access to essential services in the host country. The selective conditions disproportionately target political exiles, activists, and ethnic minorities abroad. Becau
Added 2026-04-21