Football news - Why Arsenal v Manchester City was not shown in China after Mesut Ozil comments

Arsenal published a statement last night distancing itself from Ozil's comments highlighting the persecution of the Uighur Muslims in north west China.

Human rights groups claim more than a million Uighurs are being held in detention centres without trial and leaked information last week showed an alleged move towards forced labour.

The Chinese government has always strongly denied the claims and says it is being forced to act through 're-education camps' against violent religious extremism in the Xinjiang region.

The accusation from the Arsenal midfielder has sparked anger in China and the government-controlled sports broadcaster CCTV-5 pulled their coverage of the team's clash with Manchester City.

In the wake of Ozil's comments and in an apparent effort to preserve relations with such an influential and populous country, the Gunners released a message on Weibo, China's most popular social media site, which said: “Regarding the comments made by Mesut Ozil on social media, Arsenal must make a clear statement.

“The content published is Ozil’s personal opinion.

"As a football club, Arsenal has always adhered to the principle of not involving itself in politics.”

Ozil is by no means the first to speak out on the treatment of the Uighurs, a Muslim minority group of whom around 11 million are estimated to live in China, but he is one of the most high-profile figures.

The German midfielder, a Muslim himself, posted the following message to his 21 million Instagram followers.

The post said: "East Turkistan, the bleeding wound of the Ummah, resisting against the persecutors trying to separate them from their religion.

"They burn their Qurans. They shut down their mosques. They ban their schools.

"They kill their holy men. The men are forced into camps and their families are forced to live with Chinese men. The women are forced to marry Chinese men.

“But Muslims are silent. They won’t make a noise. They have abandoned them.

"Don’t they know that giving consent for persecution is persecution itself?”