{"id":4334,"date":"2018-10-29T17:52:35","date_gmt":"2018-10-29T17:52:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iuhrdf.org\/en\/2018\/10\/29\/explainer-chinas-persecution-uighur-muslims\/"},"modified":"2018-10-29T17:52:35","modified_gmt":"2018-10-29T17:52:35","slug":"explainer-chinas-persecution-uighur-muslims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/explainer-chinas-persecution-uighur-muslims\/","title":{"rendered":"Explainer: China’s persecution of Uighur Muslims"},"content":{"rendered":"
Who are the Uighurs?<\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n
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The <\/span>Uighurs,<\/span> also spelled Uyghurs and pronounced wee-<\/span>gurs<\/span>, are an ethnically Turkic community from Central Asia who <\/span>have<\/span> practiced Islam since the tenth century.<\/span><\/p>\n

The largest concentration of Uighurs <\/span>live<\/span> in China’s northwestern Xinjiang province, a <\/span>now<\/span> autonomous region which was its own <\/span>nation state<\/span> until 1949 when the People’s Republic of China was formed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Roughly 10 million Uighurs live in Xinjiang, making up around 46 percent of the province’s population, and ethnic minorities including other Turkic Muslims such as Kazakhs and Huis make up another 14 percent, according to the 2010 census<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Uighurs also speak their own Turkic language similar to Uzbek.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the Hong-Kong based group the Uyghur Human Rights Project<\/a>, Uighurs mainly practice moderate Sufi Islam and lead “predominantly secular lives”. Therefore the current crackdown being waged against them by the Chinese <\/span>government,<\/span> carried out in the name of “de-<\/span>extremification<\/span>“, has raised some eyebrows.<\/span><\/p>\n

Xinjiang is vast, making up around <\/span>one sixth<\/span> of Chinese territory. It shares its longest borders with ethnically Turkic and Mongol states such as Mongolia, Kazakhstan <\/span>and<\/span> Kyrgyzstan.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n<\/a><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n\n
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 <\/td>\nLocal Uighurs watch the traditional Uighur dancing show in the streets of Kashgar, northwestern Xinjiang [Getty]<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Located on the former Silk Road, the province is rich in oil and other <\/span>resources,<\/span> and has thus been the target of a state-sponsored mass migration of Han Chinese \u2013 the country’s dominant ethnic group \u2013 into the province.<\/p>\n

As well as aiding the rapid<\/span>industrialisation<\/span> of the region, many see the influx of Han as an attempt to stamp out the Uighur’s cultural, ethnic and religious influence over the province and kill off any unified separatist movement.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Read more on the Uighur crisis:<\/strong><\/p>\n

– The Uighur Muslim crisis is worse than you think<\/a><\/p>\n

– ‘Cold-hearted’ China policy taking Muslim Uighur children from families<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

– China ‘prepares DNA testing’ of Muslims in Xinjiang<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

– Chinese authorities ban Muslim children from attending religious events over winter break<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

– China demands all mosques to raise <\/a><\/em><\/span>national<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/em> flag<\/a><\/p>\n

– China bans Islamic baby names in Muslim-majority Xinjiang<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

– China’s Uighur oppression runs deeper than Islamophobia<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

The Uighur and other Turkic Muslims have for years alleged unfair treatment and discrimination at the hands of the Han and the Chinese government, <\/span>however<\/span> the revelations recent months have only just begun to uncover the true scope of the issue.<\/span><\/p>\n

Timeline: China’s crackdown<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The discrimination and oppression of the Uighur people <\/span>predates<\/span> even their incorporation into the People’s Republic of China in 1949.<\/p>\n

Over the past decade<\/span>however<\/span>, Xinjiang’s residents have witnessed human rights violations skyrocket to “a scope and scale not seen in China since the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution,” according to a Human Rights Watch report<\/a> published this month.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2009, riots broke out in Urumqi, Xinjiang’s capital, over unfair treatment by the Han. <\/p>\n

An estimated 200 people were killed, and many more injured when Chinese forces quashed the protests. <\/span><\/p>\n

However<\/span> the Chinese government has blamed separatist Uighur groups for the deaths, a tactic that has allowed them to implement increasingly draconian “de-<\/span>extremification<\/span>” policies in the province.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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 <\/td>\nEthnic Uighur protest in Brussels against China’s policies 
against Muslims in Xinjiang province [Getty]<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Sporadic terrorist attacks across <\/span>the China<\/span> in the following years were also blamed on the separatists, including a 2013 attack in Beijing. <\/span><\/p>\n

The incidents paved the way for China to launch its so-called “Strike Hard Campaign against Violent Terrorism” in Xinjiang in May 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2016, Chen Quanguo was appointed Communist Party leader of Xinjiang. Chen became notorious for overseeing the ethnic crackdown in <\/span>Tibet,<\/span> and employs similar tactics against Xinjiang’s Muslims.<\/p>\n

Purported to be in the name of preventing violence, separatism<\/span>and<\/span> religious extremism, China has banned long beards, veils and Islamic names. <\/p>\n

Non-government schools were shut down and it became illegal to not watch state television. Devout Muslims were even encouraged<\/a> to drink alcohol, smoke and eat pork.<\/span><\/p>\n

The government simultaneously ramped up surveillance levels and security to dystopian levels, for <\/span>example<\/span> police officers started wearing smart glasses installed with facial recognition technology that could tell if a person had strayed far from their registered address. <\/p>\n

All vehicles belonging to Uighur were tracked with GPS monitors<\/a>. Reports of Uighur being stopped and imprisoned for attempting to leave the country have also surfaced.<\/p>\n

People are detained for openly practicing their religion, or having religious content on their phones.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2017, criminal arrests in Xinjiang accounted for 21 percent of the total arrests<\/a> in China, despite it being home to only 1.5 percent of the population.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gay McDougall, a member of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, said during a review of China’s human rights last month that China is turning Xinjiang into “something resembling a massive internment camp, shrouded in secrecy, a sort of no-rights zone”.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n
 <\/td>\n<\/span><\/td>\nChina has banned long beards, veils and Islamic names. Devout Muslims were even encouraged to drink alcohol, smoke and eat pork<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n<\/span><\/td>\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

‘Re-education’ camps<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The UN has cited credible reports that about one million Uighurs are currently being held in internment camps, where they are forced to denounce Islam and take part in indoctrination-like activities such as singing communist songs, learning the history of communist China and praising the president. <\/p>\n

Those who disobey reportedly are subject to torture such as solitary confinement, deprivation of food and water and sleep, and even waterboarding.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Kenneth Roth<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n
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