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A general view of Urumqi, Xinjiang Province, China in 2017.Sue-Lin Wong/Reuters

There isn’t much Zhao Yougang can do to help sell a home in the distant northwest of China these days. Like many people in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang region where a July outbreak of coronavirus cases prompted authorities to maintain a sweeping and lengthy lockdown, Mr. Zhao cannot move around the city.

“We can’t take clients to visit houses now,” said the real estate agent. “We can’t even step out of the gate of our residential communities.”

But that hasn’t stopped the phone from ringing, as he fields an unusual number of calls from people looking to leave Urumqi. “Compared to the situation a few months ago, there’s an obvious increase in the number of people who want to sell,” he said.

He pointed to typical late-summer factors, including parents of high-school graduates looking to move to be near their children’s universities.

But some callers are motivated by the crushing effects of a pandemic that has played out differently in Xinjiang – a place where authorities have wielded immense power over people’s lives, including the forcible political indoctrination of large numbers of the largely Muslim Uyghur population – than elsewhere.

“Some people can’t handle the situation here. So they decided to leave,” Mr. Zhao said.

Inside China, the severity of the pandemic lockdown has earned few comparisons with the treatment of Uyghurs, many of whom have been incarcerated without charges, although authorities have generally won praise domestically for their response to what officials call a problem of religious extremism. But the anger among Han Chinese residents in Xinjiang at the epidemic measures forms one of the first wide-scale expressions of dissatisfaction at the tactics employed by the region’s authorities.

Locking large numbers of people in apartments for weeks and months has created discontent, particularly after the region reported no new cases since Aug. 16.

People in Xinjiang have posted to social media a litany of complaints about local coronavirus measures, which in some cases have been more harsh than those in Wuhan, the city at the epicentre of the global COVID-19 pandemic.

The complaints have been serious enough that authorities responded by posting cellphone numbers of local officials who could respond to complaints.

“There are thousands of families and each of them have different problems now,” said Liu Haijiang, a leader in Dabancheng District – an area that is also home to one of the region’s largest centres for political indoctrination and skills training, where many Uyghurs have been incarcerated.

Mr. Liu said restrictions in the area had been loosened, and people allowed to step out of their homes.

“We have made our anti-virus work more human and more colourful,” Mr. Liu said. “We’ve launched various kinds of online activities, and made great efforts to help people secure basic necessities.”

Such reassurances, however, have done little to quell anger in Xinjiang. Social-media expressions of unhappiness – photos of at least two people handcuffed to metal fences, personal accounts of people locked inside for 65 days and night-time video of numerous people screaming together in anger from apartment buildings – have been punctuated by messages from people who say they’ve had enough and now want to leave the region. Many posts have been censored, creating even more anger.

“I’ve been under home quarantine since July 15,” said Ms. Qi, a woman in Urumqi. The Globe and Mail is not identifying her in full because of the risk of reprisal to people in the region who speak out. Authorities sealed her door with tape. She risks weeks of detention and a large fine if she opens it.

“I’ve made up my mind, I will leave Xinjiang right away once this epidemic is over,” she said.

Since bringing the coronavirus largely under control, authorities across China have received plaudits for their response. New eruptions of the virus in different parts of the country have been met with swift measures to lock down specific areas at risk. In Beijing, an outbreak at a large market in June brought “wartime measures” and mass testing – but was declared under control just two weeks later, after 256 people were infected.

Urumqi, a city of 3.5 million, has reported 826 new cases since July 15. Local authorities have not updated death numbers since the end of July, but have said 2,506 people remain under medical observation, a term that often describes enforced quarantine.

Because the lockdown remains in place for many, people aren’t yet able to move freely, much less move homes, meaning accurate statistics aren’t available on how significantly pandemic enforcement will affect the willingness of people to live in Xinjiang.

Local authorities denied any problems. “As far as concern about people leaving Urumqi, that’s not something I’ve heard about at this moment,” said Qiao Quan, Communist Party secretary in Midong District.

The Chinese government has for years encouraged people from elsewhere in China to move to the region. Three-quarters of the population in Urumqi is Han Chinese, according to the most recent statistics.

For Ms. Qi, the lockdown has been worsened by her troubles in securing the anti-depressants she relies upon. Early in the lockdown, she ran out. “Since nobody was allowed to leave their homes, I mentioned what I needed to the community. But they were unable to get the medicine, either,” she said. It was only when she committed self-harm that she was taken to a hospital, and provided the necessary medication.

“My mind is filled with unhappiness and disappointment,” she said. “The quarantine policy is what has pushed me to this point.”

Others have expressed similar sentiments.

“It’s true that Xinjiang is a good place. It’s also true that the policy here is terrible,” wrote one person on social media, after describing previous ambitions to settle down and have a family in Urumqi. “Now for the happiness of the next generation, I will sell my house – maybe in a year, when the real estate market goes back to normal,” the person wrote.

Not even immediate removal of quarantine measures would “compensate the hellish pain I’ve suffered in this past month,” wrote another, who described feelings of anger, anxiety, fatigue, loneliness and depression. “The most baffling thing is that I live in a low-risk district, and things are still so ugly. I look forward to the day of being set free, and leaving this land behind.”

In response to local criticism, officials in Urumqi have cut some taxes and allowed businesses to defer payments of social insurance and other obligations.

But Mr. Zhao, the real estate agent, says it’s not enough. Among those looking to leave are people who have “decided to sell their properties here because the epidemic has crushed the local economy, making people’s income and life less stable,” he said.

With reporting by Alexandra Li

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