Less than a week after a tightly controlled trial, a Chinese court Tuesday found a prominent Uyghur scholar guilty of "separatism" and sentenced him to life in prison, his lawyer said.

Ilham Tohti, an economics professor at Beijing's Minzu University, was tried for two days last week at the Intermediate People's Court in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang.

The trial took place in China's restive western region where a spate of recent violent incidents have been blamed by the government on Muslim Uyghur separatists seeking to establish an independent state.

The court also ordered the confiscation of all of Tohti's assets, said Liu Xiaoyuan, one of Tohti's lawyers,

Police detained the 44-year-old academic -- along with several of his students -- in Beijing in January and took him to his native Xinjiang. Tohti spent months in jail before state prosecutors charged him with the serious crime of "splitting the country."

Liu told CNN before the court announcement that he and his client were prepared for a guilty verdict and would appeal.

The ruling Communist Party controls all aspects of China's judicial process and, according to the country's supreme court, the conviction rate for criminal trials stood at 99.9% at the last count.

"Whatever the result, he said he would face up to it," Liu said, while anticipating a heavy sentence for Tohti. "But he emphasized he's not a separatist, just someone who offered constructive criticism on the government's ethnic policies."

"He maintained that he'd always been trying to preserve ethnic unity, not to destroy it," the lawyer added. "What he wanted was the implementation of human rights, rule of law and genuine autonomy in Xinjiang."

(CNN)