Zumret Obul

Zumret Obul (; ; born May 1965) is a Chinese Uyghur politician who has served as chair of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Regional People's Congress since 2023 and as a member of the 13th National People's Congress. Prior to this, she worked in finance and in department stores, serving as manager of Minmao Department Store (1992–2001), before serving as mayor of Yengisar County (2008–2012) and Hami (2017–?) and in several local Chinese Communist Party (CCP) positions within her native Kashgar.

Biography Zumret Obul, an ethnic Uyghur from Kashgar, was born in May 1965 and educated at Kashgar Finance and Trade School, and later at the Tianjin University School of Management (1998–1999). After a brief stint at the Shufu County Pharmaceutical Company's pricing department, she started a long career in department stores, including as manager of Minmao Department Store (1992–2001) and deputy manager of Kashgar Prefectural Department Store (1995–2001).

In February 2021, she was promoted to vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Regional People's Congress. In October 2021, she was elected as a member of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Regional Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. In November 2021, he was appointed Minister of the regional committee's United Front Work Department, and resigned from the post of Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region People's Congress.

On 18 January 2023, she was elected chair of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Regional People's Congress. In December 2023, she led a Chinese government delegation visiting Senegal and South Africa ostensibly for "telling the story of Xinjiang well"; United States-based dissident Hu Ping said that the visit was likely a part of the government's campaign to sway regional attention from its own human rights abuses against Uyghurs.