Is XJ really that bad now? When I visited in 2006, it was pretty tame with the exception of the area immediately near the border. It doesn’t even require a travel permit/full time tour guide like Tibet does.
Afaik it is now well on its way towards a full-on techno-police state dystopia aimed at the uyghurs (ai, big data, facial recognition, ideological reeducation camps, politically reliable Han Chinese as forced live-ins in uyghur families tempting them to drink alcohol and reporting on them, forced installation of surveillance apps....)