Days after Indonesia arrested four Uighur terrorism suspects in September in the country\u2019s east, China dispatched three intelligence officers to ask authorities to hand them over. <\/p>\n
March 17, 2015<\/p>\n
Days after Indonesia arrested four Uighur terrorism suspects in September in the country\u2019s east, China dispatched three intelligence officers to ask authorities to hand them over.<\/p>\n
While Indonesia initially demurred, China has now secured a preliminary agreement for the men to be returned after a trial in Jakarta, according to Irfan Idris, a senior official at Indonesia\u2019s anti-terrorism agency. The four, who are yet to be charged, face potential execution if repatriated.<\/p>\n
China pressed for the deal as part of a global operation begun last year to return terrorism suspects to Chinese soil, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the initiative is confidential. Many of the suspects are members of the Turkic-speaking Uighur Muslim minority, they said.<\/p>\n
With the program, China is using a combination of diplomatic muscle and domestic suppression to counter Islamic extremism in the western province of Xinjiang, home to most of the country\u2019s Uighurs and a region Beijing has long struggled to control. The initiative raises questions about whether Uighurs fleeing for fear of persecution may also be caught in its net.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeijing has long been concerned about the potential linkages between radicalized Uighurs and Islamist groups in Central Asia and Afghanistan, a concern only heightened with U.S. and NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan,\u201d said Michael Clarke, a research fellow at Griffith University in Brisbane who specializes in Xinjiang. \u201cMoreover the perceived growth of \u2018terrorism\u2019 and radicalism in Xinjiang threatens that region\u2019s stability and economic development.\u201d<\/p>\n
The risk for China is that any anti-Islamist push inflames separatism in Xinjiang. Its stated focus is to limit violence linked to alleged separatists in Xinjiang, after the bloody stabbing of at least 29 people at a train station in the city of Kunming in March 2014, and to stop them joining extremist movements such as Islamic State.<\/p>\n
Monitoring Uighurs<\/strong><\/p>\n While China hasn\u2019t joined the U.S.-led international coalition against Islamic State, it is working with some neighbors to find people who have sought to train with IS or with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, a militant group that seeks independence for Xinjiang and parts of Turkey and Central Asia, according to the people with knowledge of the program. More than 100 suspects have been repatriated to China over the past year, they said.<\/p>\n \u201cChina is monitoring the movements of Uighurs in Indonesia,\u201d said Sugeng Wahono, minister counselor for political affairs at the Indonesian embassy in Beijing who attended a January meeting between his country\u2019s anti-terrorism agency and China\u2019s top security chief Meng Jianzhu at Beijing\u2019s Diaoyutai state guesthouse.<\/p>\n \u201cThey are being hunted\u201d by the Indonesian authorities, he said, referring to three Uighurs being sought alongside the four currently detained.<\/p>\n Security Chiefs<\/strong><\/p>\n China has said little in public about its global hunt for suspected terrorists. During the legislature\u2019s annual meeting in March, Lu Xinhua, spokesman for the Chinese People\u2019s Political Consultative Conference, said China has launched an \u201canti-terrorism cooperation mechanism\u201d with more than 10 neighbors. The goal is to share intelligence and curb terrorism especially by the ETIM, which operates from Pakistan.<\/p>\n Meng also hinted at efforts to repatriate suspects when he attended an international meeting of security agency chiefs in June in Russia. He has traveled to Southeast Asia and the Middle East as President Xi Jinping\u2019s special envoy for cooperation on law enforcement and security.<\/p>\n Sharing Information<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cSome countries have already sent back a batch of terrorists that were based outside of China,\u201d Meng was cited as saying in video footage aired on Hong Kong-based Phoenix TV.<\/p>\n Retired General John Allen, President Barack Obama\u2019s envoy on Islamic State, said last month in Singapore he\u2019d like to exchange information with China on the fight against the militant group.<\/p>\n The U.S. would like \u201cto brief on what it is we are doing, to talk about those common aspects of the threat, whereby sharing perhaps best practices or even sharing information we could cooperate in some regard,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we\u2019ve just not had that conversation to this point.\u201d<\/p>\n China\u2019s National Security Commission and the Ministry of State Security don\u2019t have media offices and were unavailable to comment.<\/p>\n Fox Hunt<\/strong><\/p>\n The campaign is similar to the one operated by the Ministry of Public Security to track down economic fugitives — known as \u201cOperation Fox Hunt 2014\u201d — which authorities say has brought back nearly 700 Chinese. The two campaigns started around the middle of last year.<\/p>\n \u201cAbroad, its counter-terror strategy is not only focused on countering networks that might be linked back home, but also recognizing the reality that China finds itself with a global footprint,\u201d said Raffaello Pantucci, director of International Security Studies at the London-based Royal United Services Institute. \u201cThat means its nationals can increasingly be found in dangerous areas where terrorist groups operate.\u201d<\/p>\n Ansyaad Mbai, who was head of Indonesia\u2019s anti-terrorism agency when the Uighur suspects were arrested, said the four men detained were traveling on Turkish passports.<\/p>\n \u201cFor the China government this is a very serious issue,\u201d he said. China was \u201cvery worried that these people were going to be handed over to the Turkish Embassy.\u201d<\/p>\n Guantanamo Bay<\/strong><\/p>\n China\u2019s actions may cause unease among some western governments given that human rights groups say Uighurs are also leaving for fear of ill-treatment in Xinjiang. The U.S. declined to send back to China 22 Uighur terrorism suspects held in Guantanamo Bay, citing the risk of political persecution.<\/p>\n Uighur advocates have accused China of a broader crackdown on daily life that includes limiting beards and headscarves, and instructing people not to fast during Ramadan.<\/p>\n Tensions between Uighurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang have increased over the past year, with more than 100 people reported killed. Uighurs account for about 45 percent of Xinjiang\u2019s 22 million people.<\/p>\n \u201cChina is trying to portray all Uighur refugees as Islamic extremists,\u201d said Alim Seytoff, head of the Washington based Uyghur Human Rights Project. \u201cNo country should extradite any Uighurs back to China because of the political persecution they face there.\u201d<\/p>\n Asluddin Hatjani, attorney for the four detained Uighurs in Indonesia, said his clients claimed they were only \u201ctaking a leisurely tour\u201d of the region.<\/p>\n \u2018Collateral Damage\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cThe Chinese embassy has provided a translator for the men, but it appears they are frightened of him,\u201d Hatjani said, adding he was unaware of the nature of the evidence against the men who could be charged under anti-terrorism laws that carry a potential death penalty.<\/p>\n As China looks to contain violence in Xinjiang, lawmakers are deliberating the country\u2019s first anti-terrorism law, expected to pass later this year.<\/p>\n \u201cThe name of the game is if you do anti-terrorism campaigns, you\u2019ll have collateral damage and casualties,\u201d said Kam Wong, a criminal justice associate professor at Xavier University in Ohio who teaches courses on China\u2019s security forces. \u201cThe big hole in China is there is no terrorism law. There\u2019re no clear definitions of terrorism or terrorism organizations\u201d until the law is passed.<\/p>\n Thai Groups<\/strong><\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear how the proposed law may be applied to hundreds of people suspected to be from Xinjiang who are now being held in Thailand and claim to be from Turkey.<\/p>\n Worasit Piriyawiboon, a lawyer representing 17 people held in Bangkok for the past year for illegal entry, said his clients have Turkish passports and has petitioned a court to let the group, among them 13 children, be deported to Turkey.<\/p>\n \u201cThe immigration police don\u2019t allow them to go back,\u201d Worasit said. \u201cThey mention to the court that China\u2019s government doesn\u2019t allow,\u201d he said. \u201cThe police told me this is a sensitive case.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Days after Indonesia arrested four Uighur terrorism suspects in September in the country\u2019s east, China dispatched three intelligence officers to ask authorities to hand them over. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1723,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-1724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1724\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1724"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=1724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}