Activist jailed for Life in China Wins Human Rights prize

Chinese scholar Ilham Tohti, who is at present in jail for life or defending China’s mostly-Muslim Uighur minority, he received the Martin Ennals Award, the winner of which is selected by a jury of 10 activist groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. In 2014, he was sentenced to life in prison for “separatism” over a website he ran that was often critical of China’s official ethnic

policies. Before he was jailed, Tohti was known for his research on Uyghur-Han relations and has been a vocal critic of the government’s ethnic policies in Xinjiang, a resource-rich region long inhabited by the Turkic-speaking Uyghurs.

Ilham Tohti has been an outspoken critic of Beijing’s policies towards the Uyghur minority in their home region Xinjiang in western China, which has seen a security crackdown in recent years prompted by clashes that have killed hundreds.

 “The real shame of this situation is that by eliminating the moderate voice of Ilham Tohti the Chinese government is in fact laying the groundwork for the very extremism it says it wants to prevent,” Martin Ennals Foundation chairman Dick Oosting said in a statement.

The foundation is named after the first secretary general of Amnesty International and the prize is judged by the London-based rights group, along with Human Rights Watch and other leading organisations.