Below is an article by the World Uyghur Congress:
Musa Muhamad (Muhemmed), one of
the twenty ethnic Uyghurs extradited on 19 December 2009 from Cambodia
to China, was sentenced to 17 years in prison last autumn, according to a
Radio Free Asia (RFA) article published yesterday. Relatives of 25
year-old Muhamad told RFA that the Kashgar Intermediate Court sentenced
him on 20 October 2011 in a closed trial, but that authorities refuse to
provide information on the charges against him. The World Uyghur
Congress (WUC) condemns this sentence in the harshest possible terms,
and fears that the other Uyghurs forcibly returned from Cambodia are
suffering the same fate.
It is the first time that reliable
information about a member from the group of extradited Uyghurs has
reached the public. For the last two years, the Chinese government has
insistently refused to provide information on the whereabouts and legal
status of the people, despite having promised the international
community that these Uyghurs would be dealt with
transparently upon their return. The extradition, which came after
intense pressure and influence by the Chinese authorities, represented a
flagrant violation of international human rights treaties, especially
the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol (of which Cambodia is a
party), as well as international customary law; all of which prohibit
the refoulement of individuals to a country where they will face torture
or other forms of ill treatment.
“We have highlighted again and again
before the international community that Uyghurs forcibly returned to
China are in extreme risk of torture, detention and enforced
disappearance, and the case of Musa Muhamad proves once again, that our
fears are well-founded”, said WUC President and Uyghur human rights
activist Rebiya Kadeer today. “We call once again on the international
community to pressure the Chinese authorities to immediately disclose
the whereabouts of all the extradited Uyghurs and to provide the
charges, if any, that have been made against them.”
According to the “World Report 2012”,
recently released by Human Rights Watch (HRW), “in 2011 [China]
significantly increased pressure on governments in Central and Southeast
Asia to forcibly return Uighur [sic] refugees, leading to the
refoulement of at least 20 people.” The organisation highlights cases
such as the forcible return of the Uyghur refugee, Ershidin Israel, in
May 2011 from Kazakhstan to China; the extradition of 11 Uyghur refugees
from Malaysia to China in August 2011, and also the case of the Uyghur
Nur Muhammed, who was handed over to the Chinese authorities in Bangkok.
All of them have since disappeared. HRW claims that China’s record of
arbitrary detention and torture of ethnic Uyghurs places those
disappeared at grave risk of abuse, ill treatment, and torture. Other
countries, such as Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Laos, Cambodia, Uzbekistan and
Tajikistan, have also extradited Uyghur refugees and asylum seekers in
the past.
The Uyghur refugees in Cambodia,
considered by the Chinese authorities as “criminals,” had fled from
China in small groups between May and October 2009, following the July
2009 events in Urumqi, East Turkestan´s regional capital. They fled
after witnessing Chinese security forces arresting and using brutal and
lethal force against Uyghur demonstrators during the peaceful Uyghur
protest in July 2009 in Urumqi. They had applied to the United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for refugee status in Phnom Penh,
their cases were still under review when they were forcibly returned to
China. A UNHCR official stated, “in his 30 year history in UNHCR this
was the most flagrant violation of the 1951 Convention on Refugees he
had experienced.”
Following their extradition, China
rewarded Cambodia for its reprehensible action by signing an agreement
two days after the return. This agreement was reported to provide US$1.2
billion in aid to Cambodia. Originally posted at: unpo.org
