WASHINGTON - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been urged to demand an apology from China for imprisoning Uighur dissident Rebiya Kadeer, who was released Thursday ahead of the top US diplomat's Beijing visit.
Kadeer, 58, among leading members of China's Uighur ethnic group in the largely Muslim autonomous region of Xinjiang Uighur, was arrested in August 1999 while on her way to meet with a US Congressional staff delegation.
"We urge Secretary Rice to demand an apology from the Chinese government for imprisoning Rabiya for all these years because she was arrested while she was about to meet a Congressional staff delegation," said T. Kumar, Amnesty International's Washington-based advocacy director for Asia and Pacific.
Kadeer was accused by the Chinese authorities of "providing secret information to foreigners" and jailed for eight years after a secret trial.
The mother of 11 has been a symbol of struggle of the approximately eight million Turkish-speaking and mainly Muslim Uighurs, who make up one of China's largest ethnic minority groups.
Her release on medical parole was a "good beginning" for Rice "in the fight for human rights in China and elsewhere," Kumar said.
Kadeer, expected in Washington late Thursday, will join her husband and five children who all live in the United States, Kadeer's Virginia-based daughter Akida Rouzi said.
It was unlikely that she would be allowed to return to China or to Xinjiang.
Sidiki Rouzi, Kadeer's husband, is a US-based journalist who has urged greater freedoms for Uighurs.
Rice flies to Beijing this weekend on her first visit since taking over earlier this year as chief US diplomat from Colin Powell. Human rights is expected to top the agenda of discussions with Chinese leaders.
Kumar urged Rice to also secure the release of the 11th Panchan Lama, believed to be held by the Chinese authorities after his appointment by Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama in 1995.
Gendun Choekyi Nyima was only six years old when he was selected by the Dalai Lama that year but the child has not been seen for the last decade, he said.
It is believed that the Chinese authorities are holding him in a secret location, according to Amnesty International, which considers him to be a political prisoner.
Just hours before the announcement of Kadeer's release in Beijing Thursday, the United States said in Geneva it would refrain from proposing a motion criticising China at this year's session of the UN Human Rights Commission.
A member of the US delegation said the decision was taken because "in the past year they have made some progress that we like".
Her release also comes ahead of talks in Brussels between China and the European Union likely to focus on the lifting of a 15-year-old arms embargo.
The EU has demanded China do more to improve its human rights record before the ban is removed.
03/17/2005 15:42 GMT