Uyghur scholar and literary critic Yalqun Rozi, sentenced to 15 years, has served ten years in prison

(Rights Defense Network Information Center report) On October 7, 2026, this outlet learned that Uyghur scholar and literary critic Yalqun Rozi, sentenced to 15 years, has served ten years in prison.

Uyghur scholar and literary critic Yalqun Rozi was arrested on October 6, 2016, exactly 10 years ago. On January 3, 2018, he was sentenced to 15 years for “inciting subversion.” Since his arrest, his family has been unable to visit him or correspond with him for a long time.

Yalqun Rozi: Born on March 4, 1966, he is from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. His Uyghur name is Yalqun Rozi. He is a well-known Uyghur writer, lecturer, and scholar, a former senior editor at Xinjiang Education Publishing House, and a political prisoner in China.

As a senior intellectual, he spent many years and considerable effort editing a large number of Uyghur humanities textbooks, published several articles on Uyghur culture, and helped write the Uyghur teaching syllabus and language arts curriculum for primary and secondary schools from 2001 to 2011. He was thus widely welcomed by society and became a model among Uyghur intellectuals. However, after Chen Quanguo was appointed Xinjiang Party Secretary in August 2016, his far-left thinking led him to regard work on Uyghur textbooks as “a manifestation of ideological problems,” and Yalqun Rozi and many of his colleagues were consequently subjected to harsh repression. On October 6, 2016, he and all the members of the textbook editing company to which he belonged were suddenly arrested by Urumqi police. Since no charges were brought at the outset of the arrests, the alleged charges against him are unknown, but he has been out of contact ever since. On January 3, 2018, the Chinese Communist Party authorities in Xinjiang sentenced him to 15 years in prison for “inciting subversion of state power, ethnic separatism, and inciting ethnic hatred,” among other charges. His sentence runs until October 5, 2031. It is reported that, since there has been no concrete information about him from the time of his arrest through his sentencing, his health and place of detention are unknown. His family’s requests for visitation and correspondence rights have also been denied. He is currently believed to be serving his sentence at the Corps Urumqi Prison (1st Company, 104th Regiment, Xishan, Shayibake District, Urumqi, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region; postal code: 830009).