Oct 16, 2006

East Turkestan: Kadeer Seeks Help of Nobel Peace Prize Winner


Chinese dissident Rebiya Kadeer asked Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed Yunus to help introduce his successful poverty eradication concept among minority Uighur Muslims.

US-based Chinese dissident Rebiya Kadeer yesterday asked Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed Yunus to help introduce his successful poverty eradication concept among minority Uighur Muslims in China.

"I wish to congratulate him and hope he can help my people overcome poverty," said Kadeer, among 191 people nominated for the Nobel award this year.

Kadeer, leading a struggle for 8mn Uighurs in China’s autonomous northwest Xinjiang, said her people were in dire need of assistance to free them from poverty, allegedly worsened by an influx of mainland Chinese.

The 58-year-old grandmother spent six years in prison in China before she was deported in March last year to join her family in the US.

Before her arrest, Kadeer was a millionaire businesswoman and her businesses were a source of training and employment for fellow Uighurs. Her companies have come under constant harassment from the Chinese authorities and are now on the verge of collapse.

About 100,000 Uighurs, including her three sons, are languishing in jail for their political and religious beliefs.

Kadeer was nominated by a Swedish parliamentarian for "championing" Uighur rights and for being "one of China’s most prominent advocates of women’s rights."

In New York UN Secretary General Kofi Annan expressed his delight at Yunus receiving this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

Through a spokesman, Annan - himself a Nobel peace laureate - said he was delighted that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2006 has been awarded to Professor Mohamed Yunus and the Grameen Bank