Gender: Male

Perpetrator: China

Ethnic Group: Uyghur

Religion or Belief: Muslim – Unspecified/Other

Reports of Torture: No

Reports of Medical Neglect: No

Sentence: Life Imprisonment

Date of Detainment: January/15/2014

Date of Sentencing: September//2014

Current Status: Not Released

Religious Leader: No

Most Recent Type of Abuse: Imprisonment

Reason for Persecution: Ethnoreligious Identity Online Activity

Nature of Charges: Separatism

Ilham Tohti

Extra Bio Info:

Ilham Tohti is imprisoned for his ethnoreligious identity and activism. 

On January 15, 2014, authorities arrested Tohti, an economics professor, after police raided his home and seized his laptop and books.

In September 2014, Tohti was found guilty of "separatism" and sentenced to life in prison.  Prosecutors accused him of promoting independence for Xinjiang on his his Chinese-language website, Uighur Online, which he founded to to cultivate Uyghur-Han understanding.  Additionally, all of Tohti's assets were frozen.

Since 2017, Tohti has been held incommunicado.

On July 17, 2019, President Donald Trump met with Tohti's daughter, Jewher Tohti, at the White House.

Tohti has been previously targeted by the state.  In 2009, he was forcibly disappeared after authorities accused his website of helping to incite the July 2009 Urumqi Riots.  He was subsequently released. 

Rep. James R. Langevin (D-RI, Ret.) advocated for Tohti as part of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission's Defending Freedoms Project. 

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