Adil Rishit was a blogger and website administrator. He was arrested in March 2016 by Urumchi national security police and later sentenced to 15 years imprisonment for running a website named Bozqir, which was one of the most famous online forums. He is serving his term in Aksu prison.
Adil Rishit was in his 50s and worked as staff for the Uyghur Autonomous Regional Education Department in charge of technical service. He was married and had twin daughters. He lived in Urumchi with his family when he was arrested.
In 2011, Mr. Rishit created a website named Shahtur. In 2013 it changed its name to Bozkir and posted articles about Uyghur culture, history and plight, especially policy analysis; the essays received a lot of attention. On his website, Omarjan Hasan was a regular writer, editor and translator; he too was arrested and sentenced for 15 years.
Since 2013, Bozqir had always been an advocate in the Uyghur language, posting essays about the preservation movement that started in 2012 and publishing articles on preserving the mother tongue. Bozkir was also the first to report arrest and release information about Uyghur Language activists Abduweli Ayup, Dilyar Obul and Memetsidiq Abdureshit.
All Bozqir content creators were arrested on March 29, 2016: Adil Rishit, Tuniyaz Osman, Omarjan, Tursunjan Muhemmet Marshal and Ekpar Eset. They were charged with “inciting ethnic hatred” and “separatism”. There is no further information about Adil Rishit since 2017. Testimony from people who knew him can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEf_njJPKAY
