He worked as a "Senior Policy Advisor" and directed the Uyghur Division until 1979, when Uyghur-language broadcasts were discontinued for a lack of an audience under RFE/RL jurisdiction.
[6] During his time at the Division, he complained about lack of media coverage of the Uyghurs, lamenting "the international community only reacts when conflict breaks out.
In 1985 he participated in the founding of the "Allied Committee of the Peoples of East Turkestan, Tibet and Inner Mongolia", which held its first conference in 1998 in New York.
Erkin Alptekin is also on the advisory board of several international organizations situated in Asia, Europe and in the United States.
For the last 35 years Alptekin has attended more than 6,000 international conferences worldwide on various topics; published numerous articles, research papers and brochures; and has been the focus of several Western press media.