On the eve of the 40th round of the EU-China Human Rights Talks, set to begin on 13 June 2025 in Brussels, the Ilham Tohti Initiative e.V. has called on Kaja Kallas, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Commission, to use the talks to press for the immediate release of Uyghur professor Ilham Tohti, who has been imprisoned in China since 2014.
In an open letter, the organization urged the EU to help secure Tohti’s freedom and facilitate his transfer to Europe for urgently needed medical care. A renowned economist and an advocate for peaceful coexistence between Uyghurs and Han Chinese, Tohti was sentenced to life imprisonment after a two-day show trial on charges of “separatism” — charges widely condemned as unjust by the international community.
The letter highlights that Tohti, a recipient of the EU’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought and the Václav Havel Human Rights Prize, has been held incommunicado for over eight years, with no access to family visits or verified updates on his health or whereabouts. His daughter, Jewher Ilham, has stated that she does not even know whether her father is still alive.
The Initiative warns that Tohti could face the same fate as Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo, who died in custody, and argues that securing his release would send a powerful message of support to other imprisoned Uyghur scholars and Chinese human rights activists, including Rahile Dawut, Dr. Gulshan Abbas, Jimmy Lai, and Xu Zhiyong.
Calling Tohti a “prisoner of conscience,” the group emphasized that his release would mark a meaningful step toward justice, human rights, and a more inclusive future for China.
Ilham Tohti Initiative e.V.
10 June 2025
Dear Kaja Kallas,
High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Commission,
We wish the upcoming round of EU-China Human Rights Talks would have a positive impact on the lives on millions of Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hongkongers and other ethnicities leaving under Chinese CCP rule.
And we politely ask for your help and appeal to call on the Chinese government to immediately release Uyghur professor Ilham Tohti after 11 years in prison and bring the Uyghur scholar to an EU country for medical treatment.
Ilham Tohti was awarded the EU Parliament’s Sakharov Prize of Free Thought and Vaclav Havel Human Rights Prize in 2019, and since 2018 have been nominated by hundreds of scholars and politicians around the world for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The former economics professor is the best-known Uyghur intellectual in the People’s Republic of China. The Uyghurs are a Muslim Turkic people who live mainly in northwest China, in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
For more than two decades, Ilham Tohti tirelessly advocated for constructive dialogue and mutual understanding between the Uyghur and majority Han Chinese communities. Nevertheless, in September 2014, after a two-day show trial, he was sentenced to life in prison on charges of “separatism”. Ilham Tohti has never advocated confrontation and separatism. He advised harmonious cooperation and mutual respect between the Chinese authorities and the Uyghur people and did everything in his power to facilitate reconciliation and peace in the Uyghur region.
There is no official information about whereabouts, health and physical conditions of Ilham Tohti, and his wife Güzelnur was not able to visit her husband for the last 8 years. Despite the Chinese law stipulates, he is not enjoying his right of visitations, illegally kept in Prison Number 1, in Urumchi de facto incommunicado. His daughter Jewher Ilham says, she doesn’t know whether his father is alive.
This is a calculated and cruel deprivation, and the combination of denial of visits, communication, gag orders, and family reprisals, have been carefully engineered to punish the Uyghur scholar with degrading treatment and psychological torture, while at the same time keeping his plight away from international attention.
Ilham Tohti is a prisoner of conscience, and his freedom would be a crucial step in advancing human rights and justice in China. His release would show the world that many people are waiting with hope for a China where people like Ilham Tohti can help build a great multicultural country that respects the life, dignity, rights and individual contribution of every citizen. It would also be a signal to hundreds of other Uyghur prisoners of conscience currently in jail, including Rahile Dawut, a renowned ethnologist, and Dr. Gulshan Abbas. The Uyghur scholars release would be an encouragement to such well-known peaceful fighters for democracy as Jimmy Lai, Joshua Wong, Xu Zhiyong, Ren Zhiqiang and Ding Jiaxi.
As the international concern about Ilham Tohti’s health have been growing, we fear he might die in prison (due to not sufficient medical care) like late former Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo, and kindly ask you to advocate for Ilham Tohti to receive medical treatment in Europe.
Please accept, Mrs. Kallas, our sincere thanks for your attention and goodwill.
Sincerely yours,
Enver Can
President
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