The
words of China’s most famous political prisoner
In
Xinjiang, the large northwest region of China, the government has
imprisoned more than a million Uyghurs in reeducation camps. One of
the incarcerated—whose sentence, unlike most others, has no end
date—is Ilham Tohti, an intellectual and economist, a prolific
writer, and formerly the host of a website, Uyghur Online. In 2014,
Tohti was arrested; accused of advocating separatism, violence, and
the overthrow of the Chinese government; subjected to a two-day
trial; and sentenced to life. Nothing has been heard from him since.
Here
are Tohti’s own words, a collection of his plain-spoken calls for
justice, scholarly explanations of the history of Xinjiang, and
poignant personal reflections. While his courage and outspokenness
about the plight of China’s Muslim minorities is extraordinary,
these essays sound a measured insistence on peace and just treatment
for the Uyghurs.
Winner
of the PEN/Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award and the Sakharov Prize
for Freedom of Thought while imprisoned, this book is the only way to
hear from a man who has been called “a Uyghur Mandela.”