Citizens of restive region of 11m Muslim Uighurs must apply to get papers back<\/p>\n
Citizens of restive region of 11m Muslim Uighurs musNOVEMBER 24, 2016<\/span><\/p>\n \u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200bby: Lucy Hornby in Beijing<\/p>\n China has ordered all residents in its western frontier region of Xinjiang to hand in their passports, the latest in a series of draconian moves in the restive province home to an 11m Muslim minority.<\/p>\n Citizens of Xinjiang, an oil-rich but ethnically divided region more than six times the size of the UK, must hand their documents to police and apply to get them back if they want to travel, state-controlled newspaper Global Times<\/a> reported on Thursday. The purpose was to \u201cmaintain social order\u201d, the paper said. <\/p>\n The region\u2019s 11m Uighurs, a Muslim people with linguistic and cultural ties to Turkey who account for roughly half of Xinjiang\u2019s 23m people, have in recent years faced growing restrictions on travel, religion and dress. Authorities have clamped down on symbols of Islam such as beards and the veil, while the province\u2019s 800,000 civil servants are prohibited from taking part in religious activities.<\/p>\n The passport announcement was greeted with anger and dismay by Chinese internet users, who complained they would need to submit unusual amounts of personal information and travel documents to get their passports back. Some Xinjiang residents working in other parts of China<\/a> have received phone calls telling them to travel home and hand in their passports.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s going on in Xinjiang? Do people here have human rights or not? Can\u2019t the government just let us live an easier life?\u201d one poster wrote on Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter. \u201cI am so angry.\u201d<\/p>\n Many Xinjiang Uighurs oppose Chinese rule and what they see as colonialist policies in the native region. A violent insurgency has sporadically surfaced in recent years, while hundreds of Uighurs have turned up in human trafficking camps<\/a> in Southeast Asia or with forged passports in Turkey.<\/p>\n Beijing blames the rising appeal of radical Islam among Uighurs for a series of fatal attacks in recent years, while Uighurs fault China\u2019s repressive rule as well as problems such as uncompensated land grabs for the unrest.<\/p>\n Kyrgyzstan\u2019s state security forces have said Syria-based Uighur militants were behind a suicide bombing of the Chinese embassy in Bishkek<\/a> in September.<\/p>\n Outside Xinjiang, China\u2019s anti-corruption campaign has extended to millions of ordinary citizens the limitations on travel often meted out to political dissidents and \u201ctroublemakers\u201d. <\/p>\n Many civil servants have had to hand in their passports over the past few years \u2014 overseas jaunts by officials or travel to move assets abroad<\/a> have been one of the more common \u2014 and resented \u2014 forms of official corruption in China. While China issues both official and personal passports, in some cases civil servants have had to hand in both.<\/p>\n