SW News: The USA will witness the annual March for Martyrs at the National Mall in Washington DC on Saturday. The event is being held to highlight the plight of persecuted Christians across the globe.

The march will be held for the third year in a row with a focus on China, said Gia Chacón, founder of the non-profit For the Martyrs.

Celebs including basketball player Enes Kanter Freedom are part of the march. The speakers include Open Doors USA CEO David Curry and Andrew Brunson, a US pastor who was jailed in Turkey for two years. Freedom, a Muslim, has been candid about human rights issues in his native Turkey and other places across the globe.

Chacón in an email told Religion News Service, “Including a speaker with Freedom’s religious background sends a message about the need to build bridges between Christians and Muslims.”

In a Fox News opinion piece that he co-wrote, Freedom decried those who remain silent about religious oppression.

“From Uyghur Muslims in China who are imprisoned and forced into concentration camps to Christian schoolgirls murdered in public in Nigeria, all people of all faiths are entitled to the same rights, dignity, and respect,” he wrote. Freedom is known for his sharp criticism of China’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims.

In January, the US State Department reported that more than a million Uyghurs and members of other ethnic groups have been illegally imprisoned or taken to detention camps in China. The report also stated forced sterilizations, torture, severe restrictions on religious freedom, and forced labor.

Governments around the world consider China’s treatment of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim minorities to be a genocide.

China, however, strongly denies any abuse in either Tibet or Xinjiang which is home to the Uyghur population.

Freedom has also taken his protest even to his shoes. In a game against the Charlotte Hornets, the NBA player wore a pair of custom-made shoes with the slogans “modern-day slaves” and “no more excuses” on them. He has also worn shoes with the messages “Free Tibet,” “Free Uyghur” and “Free China.”