The police officers came for Ayshem Mamut a week ago at her home in northwest China.

一周前，警察来到阿依夏木·马木提（音）位于中国西北边陲地区的家中。

They told her to pack her bags. She could have been taken to a prison, a detention center or an internment camp, just like many other ethnic Uyghur Muslims who have vanished, sometimes for years.

他们叫她收拾行李。她本以为会被送进监狱、拘留中心或拘禁营，像许多维吾尔族穆斯林那样与外界失去联系，有时长达数年。

But four days later, the 73-year-old Chinese citizen was in Virginia having a Thanksgiving meal with two sons she had not seen in 20 years and four grandchildren she had never met.

但四天后，这名73岁的中国公民却在美国弗吉尼亚州与两个已经20年没见面的儿子和四个从未见过的孙辈一起吃了丰盛的感恩节大餐。

She sometimes talked, sometimes cried, as they ate traditional Uyghur dishes of noodle soup, lamb stew, broiled chicken, salad and rice with chickpeas.

他们一起吃着传统的汤面、炖羊肉、烤鸡、沙拉和鹰嘴豆闷饭等维族菜肴，她时而说话，时而流眼。

Last week, U.S. officials said that China had freed three American men, one of them an F.B.I. informant, in exchange for two imprisoned Chinese spies and at least one other Chinese citizen. But as part of that deal, China also quietly agreed to allow Ms. Mamut and two other Uyghurs, one an American citizen, to leave the country for the United States.

美国官员上周表示，中国释放了三名美国男子，其中一人是联邦调查局的线人，作为交换，美国释放了两名被监禁的中国间谍和至少一名中国公民。但作为交换的一部分，中国还不张声色地同意允许马木提和另外两名维吾尔人（其中一人是美国公民）离开中国前往美国。

The Biden administration has not made public the part of the deal involving the Uyghurs, and it is being reported here for the first time.

拜登政府尚未公布交换协议中涉及维吾尔人的部分，这篇报道是首次将其公诸报端。

“Waking up in America and seeing my family, especially my grandchildren, is nothing short of a dream come true,” Ms. Mamut said.

“在美国一觉醒来看到我的家人，尤其是我的孙子孙女们，可以说是梦想成真了，”马木提说。

The story of the Uyghurs’ journey to freedom is one of persistent efforts by anguished family members and American officials in the face of an increasingly authoritarian China. U.S. officials privately raised the cases for years in talks with their Chinese counterparts. President Biden mentioned Ms. Mamut twice in face-to-face meetings with Xi Jinping, China’s leader.

这些维吾尔人获得自由是痛苦不堪的家人以及美国官员在日益专制的中国面前用坚持不懈的努力换来的。多年来，美国官员在与中国同行见面时，都会在私下里提到这些维吾尔人。拜登总统在与中国领导人习近平的两次会晤中都提到了马木提。

China had barred Ms. Mamut from leaving the country because her oldest son, Nury Turkel, was involved in advocacy for Uyghur rights.

中国曾一直禁止马木提出国，因为她的大儿子努里·特克尔参与了倡导维吾尔族权益的活动。

“It’s amazing to me that she was able to keep it together all those years,” Mr. Turkel, 54, a former U.S. official and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said in an interview. He hugged his mother on the tarmac and wept last Wednesday night after she stepped off a Boeing 767 chartered by the U.S. government at a military base in San Antonio, Texas.

“她这么多年都熬过来了，真是了不起，”现年54岁的特克尔在接受采访时说，他曾任美国官员，现任哈德逊研究所高级研究员。上周三晚，美国政府包租的波音767飞机降落在得克萨斯州圣安东尼奥的一个军事基地，母亲从飞机上走下来后，特克尔在停机坪上拥抱了母亲，还流下了眼泪。

“Her ability to endure, to not lose sight, to manage her disappointment is something that personally I can’t do as a free person.”

“她身上那种承受磨难、不迷失方向、管理失望情绪的能力，是我作为一个自由人所做不到的。”

拜登总统曾两次向中国国家主席习近平提到马木提，包括两人上个月在秘鲁利马见面时。

Mr. Turkel and his family have experienced the hardships of Chinese rule for more than a half-century. Ms. Mamut gave birth to him in a re-education camp in Kashgar in 1970, during China’s Cultural Revolution. He came to the United States as a graduate student in 1995, was granted asylum and then invited his parents to visit him. They came in 2000 and again in 2004, when he graduated from American University’s law school.

特克尔和他的家庭曾在中国统治下经历了半个多世纪的苦难。马木提1970年在喀什的一个再教育营里生下了大儿子，那是在中国的文化大革命期间。1995年，特克尔以研究生的身份来到美国，后来获得了庇护，他曾邀请父母来美国探亲。他们曾在2000年来过一次，2004年，他从美国大学的法学院毕业时，他们又来过一次。

Mr. Turkel became a leading advocate for Uyghur human rights, including working on cases of Uyghurs detained by the U.S. military in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba during the post-9/11 wars. In 2009, his parents wanted to visit him in the Washington area. When the police refused to give them their passports, they realized they were barred from traveling because of Mr. Turkel’s advocacy work. Mr. Turkel then began trying to bring pressure on the Chinese government to let his parents leave the country.

特克尔后来成了维族人权的主要倡导者，他处理过的案子包括“9·11”事件后被美军关押在古巴关塔那摩湾的维吾尔人。2009年，他的父母想来华盛顿地区看望他。警方拒绝将护照还给他们后，他们意识到，由于特克尔的倡导工作，他们被禁止出国旅行。那之后，特克尔开始试图向中国政府施压，让其允许他的父母离开。

Chinese officials allowed Mr. Turkel’s father, Ablikim Mömin, a retired professor, to travel for two weeks in 2015 to meet with his four sons in Turkey, but their mother was forced to stay at home.

中国官员曾允许特克尔的父亲、退休教授阿布力克木·莫明 （音）2015年前往土耳其两周，与他的四个儿子见面，但他们的母亲被迫留在家里。

2004年，特尔克从法学院毕业后与母亲马木提和父亲阿布力克木·莫明的合影。

Mr. Turkel spoke with officials in the Obama and Trump administrations about his parents’ situation. When President Donald J. Trump visited Beijing in 2017, he gave Mr. Xi a list of people his administration wanted freed. Mr. Turkel’s parents were on the list, as was Ilham Tohti, a Uyghur professor sentenced to life in prison in 2014 on a conviction of “separatism.”

特克尔曾向奥巴马政府和特朗普政府的官员提出父母的情况。时任总统特朗普2017年访问北京时曾交给习近平一个名单，上面是他的政府希望中国释放的人。特克尔的父母和维吾尔族教师伊力哈木·土赫提都在那个名单上。2014年，伊力哈木以“分裂国家”的罪名被判处无期徒刑。

In May 2020, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, appointed Mr. Turkel to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, where he would serve for four years. Mr. Turkel told Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken about his parents’ plight during an online meeting in the fall of 2021.

2020年5月，时任众议院议长的加利福尼亚州民主党人南希·佩洛西任命特克尔为美国国际宗教自由委员会委员，任期四年。2021年秋，特克尔曾在一次网络会议上向国务卿安东尼·布林肯描述了他父母的困境。

In December 2021, China announced sanctions against four U.S. officials on the religious freedom commission, including Mr. Turkel, in retaliation for sanctions that the Biden administration had imposed on Chinese officials for abuses in Xinjiang.

2021年12月，中国宣布对包括特克尔在内的四名美国宗教自由委员会官员实施制裁，以报复拜登政府对中国官员在新疆的侵权行为实施的制裁。

特克尔在众议院为对抗中国共产党设置的特别委员会的听证会上，摄于2023年3月。

Mr. Turkel spoke with R. Nicholas Burns, the designated U.S. ambassador to China, before he left for Beijing. Mr. Burns later asked U.S. diplomats to check on Mr. Turkel’s parents in the city of Urumqi. “He made a personal commitment,” Mr. Turkel said.

在尼古拉斯·伯恩斯前往北京就任美国驻华大使前，特克尔曾与他交谈。伯恩斯后来曾让美国外交官去乌鲁木齐看望特克尔的父母。“他做出了个人承诺，”特克尔说。

Mr. Turkel’s father died in April 2022, at age 83. Mr. Turkel was on an official trip to Uzbekistan but could not fly to China for the funeral because of the sanctions against him.

特克尔的父亲已于2022年4月去世，享年83岁。特克尔当时正在以官员身份访问乌兹别克斯坦，但由于中国政府的制裁，他不能飞往中国参加葬礼。

“Because of years of enforced family separation, and along with social isolation, he was losing it,” Mr. Turkel said. “He was wanting to go.”

“由于家人多年来被迫分离，以及在社会上处于隔离状态，他已不想活下去，”特克尔说。“他想一走了事。”

Mr. Burns invited Ms. Mamut, now widowed, to visit him in Beijing, but security officers at the airport in Urumqi kept her from boarding a plane, Mr. Turkel said.

马木提丧偶后，伯恩斯曾邀请她来北京看看，但乌鲁木齐机场的安检人员没有让她登机，特克尔说。

“That was a public slap to all of us,” he said. “It was morally crushing for my mom.”

“那对我们所有人来说是一次公开的训斥，”他说。“对我妈妈来说是一次精神上的沉重打击。”

U.S.-China relations hit a low point in early 2023 after the Pentagon discovered a Chinese spy balloon above the continental United States. Mr. Turkel was losing hope and expressed his frustration in congressional testimony and essays.

2023年初，五角大楼在美国大陆上空发现了一只中国间谍气球后，中美关系跌至低谷。特克尔失去了希望，他曾在国会听证会上和文章中表达过自己的沮丧。

But U.S. officials persisted. Mr. Turkel said that Mr. Biden mentioned his mother in a meeting with Mr. Xi in Woodside, Calif., that November, then again last month in Lima, Peru. Still, as recently as early last month, Mr. Turkel did not sound optimistic when we spoke at an event.

但美国官员们仍坚持不懈。特克尔说，拜登去年11月与习近平在加利福尼亚州伍德赛德见面时提了他的母亲，并在上个月在秘鲁利马与习近平会晤时再次提了他的母亲。尽管如此，我们在上月初的一次活动上谈起这件事时，特克尔听起来并不乐观。

Then on Nov. 24, a White House official told Mr. Turkel that his mother would be on a U.S. government plane leaving China later that week. Around the same time, the police officers were visiting Ms. Mamut’s home. Mr. Turkel spoke to her by phone and told her to go along with whatever the officers suggested.

后来，白宫官员在11月24日告诉特克尔，他的母亲将于那周晚些时候乘坐美国政府的飞机离开中国。大约在同一时间，警察来到了马木提家中。特克尔与母亲通了电话，叫她按照警察的所有要求去做。

Ms. Mamut spent that Monday seeing a dentist, visiting her husband’s grave and packing a bag with traditional Uyghur silk cloth that she could use to make clothes for her grandchildren in America. The next morning, she boarded a charter plane to Beijing with police officers and the other two Uyghurs, a man and his daughter.

在接下来的周一，马木提去看了牙医，给丈夫扫了墓，还准备了一箱子维吾尔族传统丝绸，她要用这些丝绸给在美国的孙辈做衣服。第二天早上，她和另外两名维吾尔族人（一名男子和他的女儿）与警察一起登上了飞往北京的包机。

The three of them stayed in a government guesthouse in Beijing on Tuesday night. Their planned departure was delayed by six hours, making them nervous. Then on Wednesday night, they were taken to the airport, where the U.S. government charter plane awaited them.

周二晚，他们三人住进了北京的一个政府招待所。他们原定的出发时间被推迟了六个小时，这让他们很紧张。后来，他们在周三晚间被带到机场，美国政府的包机已在那里等候他们。

Mr. Burns walked with them up the plane’s stairs and took photos inside with them. The three freed American prisoners — Mark Swidan, Kai Li and John Leung — were on the flight, as was Roger D. Carstens, the U.S. special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, and other American officials. One of the diplomats put Ms. Mamut on the phone with her son.

伯恩斯把他们送上飞机的舷梯后，在机舱里与他们合了影。那三名从监狱里释放出来的美国人——马克·斯威丹、李凯和梁成运——已在飞机上，负责人质事务的总统特使罗杰·卡斯滕斯和其他美国官员也在飞机上。其中一名外交官让马木提与儿子通了电话。

The Uyghurs on the plane burst into tears after it took off.

飞机起飞后，机上的维吾尔人忍不住哭了起来。

Mr. Turkel and a younger brother, Mamutjan, boarded their own flight to go from Northern Virginia to San Antonio.

特克尔和弟弟马穆詹登上他们从北弗吉尼亚飞往圣安东尼奥的飞机。

At a refueling stop in Alaska, the group traveling from China got separate calls from Mr. Biden and Mr. Blinken. I was on Mr. Blinken’s official plane returning from a diplomatic trip to Rome when he made that call. After we landed outside Washington, an aide told me that Mr. Blinken had spoken to the three freed American men but did not mention there were also Uyghurs on the trip.

从中国出发的飞机在阿拉斯加加油时，机上的乘客分别接到了拜登和布林肯打来的电话。我当时正在布林肯返回美国的公务机上，他刚结束了他的罗马外交之旅。飞机在华盛顿郊外降落后，一名助手告诉我，布林肯已与三名获释的美国人通了电话，但没提那架飞机上也有维吾尔人。

Ms. Mamut left a message on Mr. Turkel’s voice mail during the Anchorage stop: “We are in America.”

马木提在安克雷奇停留期间给特克尔的语音信箱发了语音短信：“我们在美国。”

Hours later, near midnight, they were in each other’s arms on the tarmac in Texas.

几小时后，在当天午夜前不久，他们在得克萨斯州的停机坪上拥抱在一起。