Chairman Mike Gallagher (R-WI) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party have issued a joint statement condemning the reported life sentence of Uyghur academic Rahile Dawut by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The statement, published in a press release by the Select Committee on the CCP, demands the immediate release of Dawut and other unjustly detained Uyghur and Muslim intellectuals.

Rahile Dawut, an academic scholar known for preserving Uyghur culture and traditions through her writings, was reportedly taken into custody in 2017, along with an estimated 300 Uyghur intellectuals. The Uyghur Human Rights Project in 2021 found evidence of their detention. China has faced allegations of detaining more than a million Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim individuals in internment camps in Xinjiang, coupled with efforts to forcefully assimilate them.

The US State Department has also condemned the life sentence, stating, "We condemn the reported life sentence handed down by the Government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) following secret court proceedings of Professor Rahile Dawut, an anthropologist and expert on Uyghur folklore and traditions." The State Department emphasized the CCP's history of human rights abuses against Uyghurs and its broader effort to eradicate Uyghur identity and culture, including through detentions and disappearances.

A United Nations report last year found that the CCP had committed "serious human rights violations," including the incarceration of prominent Uyghur scholars, artists, and intellectuals. However, China has repeatedly denied these allegations of human rights abuses.

Gallagher and Krishnamoorthi called for the immediate release of Professor Dawut and other unjustly detained Uyghur and Muslim intellectuals. In their press release, they stated, "The Chinese Communist Party's continued genocide against the Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious minority groups is a violation of international standards protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms. The CCP insists the PRC is a 'law-based country,' but its repeated invoking of the law as a tool for the repression of Uyghur culture and traditions says otherwise."