Posts Tagged ‘Uighur’
March 11th, 2011
Tursunjan Hezim, Uighur editor of well known website Bilik, has
reportedly been given a seven-year prison sentence. The sentence was handed down for unknown charges at a secret trial in July 2010, but has only been made public now. Hezim had been in detention at a secret location since 2009, after ethnic riots broke out in the Chinese north-western region of Xinjiang.
July 26th, 2010
Journalist Gheyrat Niyaz has been given a
15-year jail sentence by the Chinese authorities after he was
found guilty of endangering Chinese national security. The Uighur journalist and blogger was given the sentence following accusations that he criticised Chinese government policy towards the Uighurs and gave evidence to Western press organisations during last year’s
race related riots in Xinjiang province.
April 22nd, 2010
Ilham Tohti, Uighur academic and
PEN member has been
banned from attending a Turkic Culture conference in Izmir, Turkey. Reports claim police officials arrived at his Beijing home on 15 April and warning him against making the trip. Tohti had already received his Turkish visa, and permission to attend the conference from Beijing’s Central Nationalities University, where he is the associated professor of Economics. He was previously
detained during the Xinjiang riots last year.
February 4th, 2010
China has warned the Swiss government that its decision to grant asylum to
two Chinese Uighurs currently detained in Guantanamo Bay will harm relations. Switzerland’s justice minister said the decision to take the brothers was guided by humanitarian principles and should not be interpreted as giving preference to one country over another. The Obama administration has sought to resettle Uighurs in third countries for fear they may be persecuted if sent back to China.
August 24th, 2009
Chinese authorities have released legal activist Xu Zhiyong and two other activists. Xu Zhiyong, founder of the Beijing-based Open Constitution Initiative, was unexpectedly freed on bail, along with co-worker Zhuang Lu, after more than three weeks in prison on charges of tax evasion. In a separate case, Ilham Tohti, an economics professor who had written about economic discrimination against the Uighur minority, was released after about six weeks in custody. Read more here
