China’s Xinjiang Troubles: Authoritative Suppression May Face Uyghur Backlash – AnalysisBY SOUTH ASIA MONITOR SEPTEMBER 21, 2016
By Anurag Tripathi and Nilanjana Ghosh*
http://www.eurasiareview.com/21092016-chinas-xinjiang-troubles-authoritative-suppression-may-face-uyghur-backlash-analysis/Ethnic tension in the Xinjiang (also East Turkestan) autonomous region of China is increasing. On the basis of situations traced in 2016, the tension is no longer limited to Xinjiang but is spreading across the border to the other Central Asian states as well. The East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), comprising mainly of the Uyghur Muslim community, is apparently instigating havoc in the region and also in the neighbouring countries recently. On August 30 there was a suicide car bomb attack in the Chinese embassy at Kyrgystan. Though there has not yet been any evidence of any radical organisation behind it but due to the conflict and protests going on in Xinjiang between Uyghur Muslims and Han Chinese the suspicion goes to the ETIM.
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Given the economic and geographic importance of Xinjiang, the Chinese government has encouraged internal migration of the Han Chinese into this region since 1949. As per the 1953 census, Uyghurs comprised of 75% of the entire population and Hans comprised of only 6%. This has changed significantly in the 2000 census which reported 45.21% Uyghurs and 40.57% Hans. Since the 1990s, accusations of marginalisation and discrimination against the Uyghur community by the government started fuelling ethnic clashes between them and the Hans. Various Uyghur groups have also been formed abroad by the exiled members of the community. It is believed that the Uyghur groups inside Xinjiang are not only supported by these groups but also by many Islamic countries, especially Turkey. The government has blamed the separatists for many terrorist activities inside the country.
Importantly, in several riots, the Chinese officials have burned down several mosques and refrained women from wearing burqas and imposed strict control over the functioning of Islamic religious schools. All this led to upheaval among the Muslim community and their determination for a separate state became stronger. But China neither in the past nor in the present wants to lose its control over the Xinjiang region and the secessionist tendencies have been curbed violently and rapidly whenever required.
Local authorities in China’s Xinjiang region have forced Muslim Uyghur farmers, government workers, teachers and the unemployed to partake in a mass event where they had to dress in traditional Chinese garb and perform tai chi, a very old form of Chinese martial arts. According to the Shule County government website, in April 2015 Chinese authorities forced Uyghur imams in Kashgar to do a dance performance in the town’s main square and female teachers had to assure not to teach Islam to children. The imams were also forced to tell children that prayer was harmful for the soul and to chant slogans in support of the state over religion and declare that “our income comes from the Chinese Communist Party, not from Allah.” On the response of this event, Ilshat Hasan, president of the Washington-based Uyghur American Association on August 25, 2016 criticized the event as another attempt by China to weaken Uyghur ethnic and cultural identity and force Han Chinese identity on the Muslim ethnic minority. There has been continuous crackdown on Uyghur inhabitants to prevent the “three evils” of terrorism, separatism, and religious extremism there, according to Radio Free Asia.
The future stability in the region still remains a matter of question. Domestic policies are partly responsible for the increasing violence. Also, the extreme and forceful measures taken by the Chinese government to wipe out Islamic ideology is leading to expanded restlessness among people and is proving to be dangerous for both China as well as the neighbouring regions. An exile Uyghur leader Rebiya Kadeer, who spoke during a press conference in Tokyo on June 20, 2013, claimed that at least 2,000 ethnic minority Uyghurs may have been killed by Chinese security forces following riots in June 2013 Xinjiang region alone, far more than reported by the state media.
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