Kazakh Police Arrest Xinjiang Activist

Kazakh police on Sunday arrested an activist who has campaigned for victims of China's re-education drive in Xinjiang, sealing his informal group's office and taking its computers.

Serikjan Bilash, who has led a loud awareness drive centred on ethnic Kazakh victims of China's crackdown in the region, was arrested in Kazakhstan's largest city Almaty and flown to the capital Astana, his partner said.

Bilash appeared on Sunday in a video filmed by Kazakh police confirming he was facing charges of inciting hatred, although it was not immediately clear what motivated the charges.

He said he had not been taken "by either the Chinese or Chinese spies".

Kazakh authorities have not made an official statement on the arrest.

The Central Asian country, which shares a border with Xinjiang province, has been on diplomatic tiptoes since major trade partner China began to forcibly send ethnic Kazakhs to internment camps under its anti-extremism policy.

"They took my husband in the early hours of Sunday and transferred him by plane to Astana. It seems to be very serious," Bilash's partner Leila Adiljan said.

Adiljan said police had set bail at the local currency equivalent of more than US$3,500 and that his Ata-Jurt rights group planned to raise the money. (AFP)