Uyghur detained in Pakistan, at risk of extradition to China
For immediate release
July 9, 2007, 10:45 EST
Contact: Uyghur American Association +1 (202) 349 1496
The Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) has learned that businessman and Uyghur activist Osman Alihan, born in 1976, was detained by Pakistani security forces in Rawalpindi, Pakistan on July 5. UHRP is gravely concerned that Pakistan plans to extradite Alihan to the PRC. Uyghurs who are accused of crimes and tried in the Chinese legal system are extremely unlikely to have access to proper legal representation and often suffer from torture and other forms of ill-treatment.
Alihan is one of around 20 Uyghurs named on a “wanted list” given to the Pakistani authorities by the PRC government in the lead-up to the recent Pakistan-China Joint Working Group on Terrorism held in Beijing on June 25. In addition to his business activities, Alihan had been working to help impoverished Uyghur students in Pakistan and Turkey. He is single and holds a Chinese passport and Chinese citizenship.
“If Mr. Alihan is extradited to China, he will be sure to suffer a terrible fate,” said prominent Uyghur leader and human rights advocate Rebiya Kadeer. “I urge Pakistani authorities to adhere to the international principle of non-refoulement, and refrain from sending Mr. Alihan to the PRC.”
Alihan was one of the organizers of peaceful protests in front of the Saudi Arabian embassy in Pakistan in August and September 2006 by Uyghurs protesting their denial of Saudi entry visas. Reportedly under intense pressure from the PRC government, Saudi authorities had refused to issue the visas, which the protestors, who had traveled to Pakistan as private citizens, were seeking in order to participate in the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, the Hajj. After the protests, and following pressure from the international community, Saudi Arabia issued visas to the Uyghur pilgrims, angering Beijing.
PRC authorities are known to consistently suppress peaceful and legitimate religious activities, and they crack down particularly hard on the religious practices of Uyghurs, who practice a moderate form of Islam. The recent confiscation of passports in East Turkistan from Uyghurs planning to participate in this year’s Hajj can be seen as a direct reaction to the success of the protest that Alihan helped to organize in Pakistan last year, and yet another manifestation of the restrictions placed on Uyghurs’ religious customs by the PRC.
Alihan had traveled to Pakistan almost two months ago from Turkey, where he was a temporary resident, in search of an undelivered good that he had imported from China and planned to send to Saudi Arabia.
Uyghurs who flee into countries neighboring East Turkistan increasingly face great danger and the risk of being sent back to the PRC. Amnesty International has documented numerous cases of Uyghurs being forcibly returned to the PRC from various neighboring states – including Pakistan – where they are then extremely vulnerable to torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
Alihan’s case is similar to that of Ismail Semed, a Uyghur who was returned to China from Pakistan in 2003 on charges of “attempting to split the motherland” and possession of explosives. Despite the fact that even Semed’s court-appointed lawyers told the judge presiding over his case that the evidence presented was not adequate enough to convict him, he was convicted, sentenced to death in October 2005 and executed on February 8, 2007. Semed’s case demonstrates the PRC’s willingness to use the legal system as a tool of intimidation and repression.
According to Semed’s sentencing document, which was seen by UHRP, the only evidence with regard to the charges of possession of explosives is the testimony of several other Uyghurs, two of whom were executed by the Chinese government in 1999. UHRP believes it likely that the testimonies of these Uyghurs were obtained through torture, and that Semed’s documented “confession to the charges against him was also likely extracted through torture.
In another case, ethnic Uyghur Shaheer Ali was executed in March 2003 following deportation back to the PRC in 2002, in that instance from the Kingdom of Nepal, which has close diplomatic relations with the PRC. Like Semed, Ali also had a history of political opposition to Chinese rule in East Turkistan, and he had also been imprisoned on a previous occasion.
UHRP urges Pakistan not to extradite Alihan, or any of the other Uyghurs named on the PRC’s “wanted list”, to China. International law forbids the extradition of any individual to a country in which their safety cannot be guaranteed.