Uyghur American Association appalled at separatism charges leveled against Ilham Tohti

For immediate Release
July 30, 2014, 11:15 am EST
Contact: Uyghur Human Rights Project +1 (202) 478 1920

The Uyghur American Association (UAA) condemns the indictment of Ilham Tohti on formal charges of “separatism” and calls on the Chinese government to end its disgraceful persecution of the Uyghur scholar and his family.

UAA believes China will not provide Ilham Tohti with a free and fair trial that meets international standards. UAA urges the international community to remind China of its obligations on arbitrary detention under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to caution Chinese officials that its approach to the Uyghur issue is creating further instability.

“The charges of separatism Mr. Tohti faces are ludicrous, even by the very low standards of China. However, the seriousness of Ilham Tohti’s case cannot be understated,” said UAA president, Alim Seytoff in a statement from Washington, DC. “Not only do we see the Chinese authorities pull to pieces the life and work of an intellectual who attempted to rationally discuss the challenges facing the Uyghur people, but we also see Chinese officials send an unambiguous message to all Uyghurs that dialogue on government policy will not be tolerated.”

“The inevitable guilty verdict in Mr. Tohti’s case means the peaceful questioning of economic discrimination, the disappearing Uyghur language and religious intolerance will be met with severe punishment,” added Mr. Seytoff.

Mr. Tohti, who worked as a professor at Beijing’s Minzu University (formerly Central Nationalities University), has often questioned the efficacy of Chinese government policies targeting Uyghurs citing worsening economic, social and cultural conditions. He is also known for operating the Uighurbiz website, shutdown since his detention, which offers information on Uyghur social issues in Mandarin Chinese and has been hosted overseas after unrest in Urumchi in 2009.

On July 30, 2014, Chinese state media reported that the Urumchi Procuratorate formally charged Ilham Tohti with separatism. Since his January 15, 2014 detention in Beijing, Chinese state media and Chinese officials have heavily prejudiced Ilham Tohti’s case.

Only three days after his detention, an op-ed in the Chinese state run Global Times accused Tohti of links to the “West,” delivering “aggressive lectures and being the “brains” behind alleged Uyghur terrorists.

The op-ed was followed by a January 24, 2014 statement from the Urumchi Public Security Bureau on its Weibo account alleging Tohti “made use of his capacity as a teacher to recruit, lure and threaten some people to form a ring and join hands with key people from the East Turkestan Independence Movement to plan and organise people to go abroad to take part in separatist activities [and]…was involved in splitting the country.” There is no public record Mr. Tohti has ever advocated independence for the Uyghur people.

A March 6, 2014 article by AFP cited Xinjiang regional chairman, Nur Bekri as stating the evidence against Ilham Tohti was “irrefutable.” Bekri added that Chinese authorities “will safeguard his legal rights while he is under investigation.”

A number of government and multi-lateral entities, as well as NGOs have expressed concern over Mr. Tohti’s case, including the United States, the European Union, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Reporters Without Borders and PEN International.

At the sixty-ninth session of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention held between April 22 and May 1, 2014, a panel of five human rights experts rendered the opinion that Ilham Tohti’s deprivation of liberty since January 15, 2014 is arbitrary.

The Working Group cited China’s violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Mr. Tohti’s case—in particular, articles 9, 10, 11, 18, 19, 20 and 21.

On June 27, 2014, UHRP reported how Professor Tohti spoke to his lawyers about the conditions of his incarceration during a meeting held at a detention facility in Urumchi on June 26, 2014. The meeting was the first between Ilham Tohti and his lawyers, Li Fangping and Wang Yu since his detention.

During the time he was able to speak to his lawyers, Mr. Tohti said he had been deprived of food and provided with one and a half glasses of water during a ten-day period in March. His lawyers also learned that although their client was receiving some medication for a number of physical conditions he suffers, the treatment was insufficient. These allegations place China in violation of articles 20 and 22 of the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.

According to Tibetan blogger, Woeser, who is a close family friend and managed to visit Ilham Tohti’s wife, Guzelnur on July 14, 2014, Chinese police in Beijing have harassed Ilham Tohti’s family since his January 15 detention.

UAA calls on all concerned parties to protest the charges of separatism leveled against Ilham Tohti and to seek his immediate and unconditional release.