Ilham Tohti, who taught Economics at Minzu University in Beijing, is being accused for separatism. He was detained on January but was not permitted to meet with his lawyer until June.

Tohti's lawyer, Li Fangping, came to know about the charges online when the local government posted it.

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Chinese authorities charged the minority scholar for allegedly rousing students to revolt against the government amid the anti-government violence in his native Xinjiang region.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf voiced out the nation's concern about the lack of transparency regarding Tohti's arrest and the detention of at least six of his students.

"We call on Chinese authorities to release Mr. Tohti and his students and to guarantee them the protections and freedoms to which they are entitled under China's international human rights commitments," Harf said.

Tohti managed a website wherein he expressed his separatist thoughts and his desire to be independent from China.

Tohti garnered the PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award earlier this year. The award-giving body PEN American Center expressed disagreement regarding the indictment. Tohti "has worked within the country's laws to promote equal rights for all of China's citizens, and to encourage exchange and understanding between different ethnic groups," the body said in a statement.

Tohti's charges amount to a political witch hunt, and show Beijing's intolerance of the most moderate and measured criticism, according to rights groups.

Such charges almost certainly lead to conviction and the charged will most likely be sentenced to several years in prison and ultimately the death penalty.

Tohti's indictment was announced just two days after an encounter between the police and the mob that left many people dead. Twenty Uighurs were killed in what they called "excessive state violence" against people protesting a suppression, according to the Uyghur American Association.

Chinese forces killed almost 100 Uighur after the demonstration on Monday, according to the World Uyghur Congress.

Tagsilham tohti, separatism