For immediate release
April 7, 2006, 20:00 EST
Contact: Uyghur Human Rights Project – 1 (202) 349 1496
(April 7, 2006, Washington, DC.)

Ismail Semed, a Uyghur who is known to have been politically active in support of Uyghurs’ human rights, has been sentenced to death following deportation from Pakistan to East Turkistan (Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region) in the People’s Republic of China (PRC)

It is not yet certain whether Semed has been executed or not, although UHRP has received unconfirmed reports of his statutory appeal being held in a closed session. If his appeal is rejected, execution would typically follow soon after the hearing is concluded

Semed was originally sentenced to death on October 31, 2005 by Urumchi City Intermediate People’s Court on charges of ‘attempting to split the motherland’ and other charges relating to possession of fire-arms and explosives

According to his sentencing document seen by UHRP, the only evidence against Ismail Semed with regard to the charges of possession of fire-arms and explosives, is the testimony of several other Uyghurs. At least two of those Uyghurs, Osman Hamit and Memet Rahmat, were themselves executed by the Chinese government in 1999 according to UHRP’s sources. UHRP is concerned that their testimonies may have been extorted through torture

The charge of ‘attempting to split the motherland’ is based on the allegation that Semed is a founding member of the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM), a group which was listed with the UN as a terrorist organization in September 2002 by the United States with the support of China and several Central Asian states. This charge appears to be based solely on second-hand testimony that Semed was present at a meeting of ETIM in March 1997 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan

However, Radio Free Asia (RFA) report sources stating that other people who were at the meeting in Rawalpindi do not even know Ismail Semed

According to the same official document seen by UHRP, Semed himself supposedly ‘confessed’ to the charges against him during interrogations, but he then denied the charges in court; even his state-appointed defense lawyer contested that all of the evidence against Semed was in the form of testimonies and was therefore inconclusive. Nevertheless, the court maintained that there was “ample evidence” to convict Semed, and passed the death sentence

“Ismail Semed has been tried and sentenced to death in the absence of even the most basic international fair trial standards,” said a spokesperson for UHRP. “Furthermore, there are grave concerns that the testimonies used as evidence to convict Semed are not only inadequate in terms of standards of evidence, but were extorted from witnesses through torture

” Ismail Semed is thought to have had a history of active opposition to the policies and practices of the Chinese administration in East Turkistan. In the early- to mid-1990s he served two prison sentences for participating in demonstrations, including one in Baren in 1990 outside the western historic city of Kashgar. The events at Baren are commonly described as a Uyghur nationalist uprising against Chinese rule of East Turkistan, an uprising which was put down when police opened fire on demonstrators and rioters killing an unknown number of people

Semed reportedly fled East Turkistan for Pakistan soon after another demonstration in the north-western city of Ghulja in February 1997, where police opened fire on demonstrators possibly killing as many as 100 people at the scene according to some accounts, and dozens more in disturbances over the following days

News of Semed’s sentence comes as fears are being expressed for the fate of another Uyghur, Huseyincan Celil, who is at extreme risk of being sent from incommunicado detention in Uzbekistan to the PRC – where he is also under sentence of death having been sentenced in absentia – despite being a naturalized Canadian citizen

The death sentence imposed on Ismael Samed is a further indication of the dangers facing Uyghurs who flee into countries neighboring East Turkistan. In 2003, he was deported from Pakistan to the PRC. Amnesty International has documented numerous cases of Uyghurs being forcibly returned to the PRC from various neighboring states – including Pakistan – where they are then extremely vulnerable to torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment

In one case, Shaheer Ali was executed in March 2003 following deportation back to the PRC in 2002, in that instance from the Kingdom of Nepal which has close diplomatic relations with the PRC. Like Semed, Ali also had a history of political opposition to Chinese rule in East Turkistan, and he had also been imprisoned on a previous occasion

Background information

The Chinese authorities allege that ETIM has been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks against mainly Chinese targets in East Turkistan in the past decade or so, but has never produced any independently verifiable evidence to support this allegation. The United States government has asserted that ETIM planned – but never carried out – an attack on the US embassy in Kazakhstan

The Chinese authorities in East Turkistan are extremely wary of any form of political opposition by Uyghurs, and are quick to brand any opposition – perceived or real – as an extremely serious crime

Even prior to the events of 9/11, the PRC led regional tendencies throughout Central Asia to regard political opposition and ‘uncontrolled’ politicized Islam as the “three evil forces” of terrorism, separatism, and religious extremism. Uyghurs in East Turkistan and beyond are regarded as the main focus of these Chinese-led regional strategies to quell and suppress any sign of Uyghur political organization

Post 9/11, the Chinese authorities have used the “war on terror” as a pretext to further increase the pressure on Uyghurs in East Turkistan and throughout the Central Asian region, including Pakistan

Chinese legal background

Although Chinese law forbids convictions based only a defendant’s confession – a relatively recent measure to try and reduce convictions based on confessions extorted through torture – a great deal or weight is still attributed to other witness testimonies and ‘confessions’

This feature of the Chinese judicial system was recently criticized by the UN Special Rapporteur on torture who stated following a mission to the PRC – which included prison visits in East Turkistan – that torture remains “widespread”

UHRP stresses there is no available evidence that torture was used in this case – or any of the associated cases – but the organization is acutely aware that torture is an extremely prominent feature of most Uyghurs’ experiences at the hands of the Chinese police and judiciary in East Turkistan

As stated above, Semed was sentenced to death on October 31, 2005, by Urumchi City Intermediate People’s Court. His statutory appeal will be heard at a level of court, in this case the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region High People’s Court – also in Urumchi

Unlike the vast majority of death sentences passed in the PRC every year, the political nature of the charges against Ismail Semed would require the case and the sentence to be reviewed by the Supreme People’s Court in Beijing. Currently, around 90% of death sentences for most categories of crime in the PRC are reviewed and approved by the same court that passes them

However, the Supreme People’s Court review is basically an administrative procedure only, and no further evidence or arguments are taken into account