A sentence of life in jail has been handed down to a university professor who campaigned for better rights for China’s Uighur minority.<br /><br />Ilham Tohti has been convicted of separatism in a case condemned by the US, the European Union and human rights groups.<br /><br />Experts say it is one of the toughest penalties in more than a decade for a case against an outspoken critic of the state.<br /><br />Tohti earlier spoke about what it was like being placed under house arrest.<br /><br />“I have been reflecting on my situation in the past three years,” he said in February 2013. “ In fact I am like a prisoner living in a cage. They don’t let me do anything. If I give interviews, they harass me or my family. They threaten me, I can’t teach anymore, they don’t let me make a living to support my family. Why?” <br /><br />Tohti became well known as a moderate voice on the question of the Muslim Uighur ethnic group, which has long complained of unfair treatment by authorities in China.
