Archive for April, 2021
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Whereabouts, Well-Being of Renowned Uyghur Poet Unknown Three Years After Detention
RFA Uyghur 2021-04-28 Abduqadir Jalalidin’s children continue to advocate on his behalf and demand his release from overseas. Uyghur scholar and poet Abduqadir Jalalidin, in an undated photo.Abduqadir Jalalidin The situation and well-being of a renowned Uyghur intellectual who was detained by authorities in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region remains unknown more than three years after he was taken into custody, according to the man’s U.S.-based son. In late April 2018, RFA’s Uyghur Service learned that Abduqadir Jalalidin, a Uyghur professor at Xinjiang Normal University as well as a well-known writer and poet, had been detained three months earlier by State Security forces in the regional capital Urumqi. Jalalidin’s writings have been popular among the Uyghur people, as have his literary translations into Uyghur, including George Orwell’s iconic novel Animal Farm. He had advised a number of graduate students, training a new generation of community researchers. His son Babur told RFA that he and his Japan-based older sister Bulbulnaz have continued to advocate for their father’s release but have obtained little information about his situation since learning of his detention. “They took him from our home on the evening of Jan. 29, 2018, around 7:00 or 8:00 p.m.,” he said. “Up to now I have been unable to obtain any information about his health or what he is doing. We also don’t know why they took him away or how long he’s been sentenced to.” According to Babur, police raided their family home one day before arresting Jalalidin, confiscating Uyghur-language materials, as well as computers, tablets and phones. “And then the next day … they took my father away and never brought him back.” “My father never broke the law. All of his works were published by government publishing houses, and prior to being published they were edited by […]
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Xinjiang Authorities Sentence Prominent Uyghur Author to 20 Years in Prison
RFA Uyghur 2021-04-23 Ahtam Omer was targeted for sending his nephew to Egypt to study and sending him money there. A facility believed to be an internment camp located north of Kashgar, in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, June 2, 2019. AFP Authorities in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) have sentenced a prominent Uyghur author, whose work was targeted in a book burning campaign following his detention four years ago, to 20 years in prison, according to officials. A tipster recently told RFA’s Uyghur Service that Ahtam Omer, the author of a collection of short stories entitled Child of the Eagle and who had been missing since early 2017, had been detained and that his book was ripped from shelves across the XUAR last year and set alight as part of a campaign to censor him. According to the source, Omer was detained in 2017 in Kashgar (in Chinese, Kashi) prefecture’s Makit (Maigaiti) county, a month after his brother Anwar Omer and nephew Iskander Omer. “Ahtam Omer was detained and taken from his home on March 12, 2017,” the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. “The basic reason for this, the reason given at the time, was that he had sent his older brother’s son to study in Egypt and sent money to him.” Egypt is one of several countries blacklisted by authorities in the XUAR for travel by Uyghurs because of a perceived risk of indoctrination with Islamic extremism. The source said Omer’s literary work was stopped during the police investigation into his activities, after which he was charged with “separatism” and sentenced to prison in a secret trial in the XUAR capital Urumqi in late 2018. In an effort to verify the claims, RFA’s Uyghur Service spoke with a representative from the office where […]
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