Authorities in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) have sentenced a septuagenarian Uyghur retiree who spent decades as a public servant to a lengthy jail term for attending a Muslim sermon during a wake held 13 years ago, according to local officials.

A source claiming inside knowledge of the situation recently told RFA’s Uyghur Service that 73-year-old Rukiya Osman, a former government official in Ghulja (in Chinese, Yining)—the seat of Ili Kazakh (Yili Hasake) Autonomous Prefecture and the XUAR’s third largest city—had been arrested and sentenced to 17 years in prison.