Freedom, Independence and Democracy for East Turkistan !

E-mail: etic@uygur.org

The main features of the Communist Chinese regime are not keeping on words, denying itself, contradiction between the words and deeds. These features of the Chinese Communist regime are well known in China and all over the world, that is why it has lost its face in inside the country as well as in the world. So at present, when many peoples in the world being under the alien's yoke are struggling for the autonomy, the people of Eastern Turkestan, which have been granted this "Autonomy" more than 40 years ago, are still struggling for their national independence. This is an evidance of that the people of Eastern Turkestan do not trust the promises and words of the Chinese Communist Government. Though the word "autonomy" used in China is the same that the term used all over the world, but the Chinese use it in absolutely different meaning than the rest world does. Though the "Law on the National Territorial autonomy in the People's Republic of China" declared extensive rights for the indigenous peoples, all these rights exist only on its pages. In practice the "autonomy" has no rights, that is why it is rather funny and pitiful when some of our countrymen call it "the top autonomy". Every country in the world has its own Principle Laws - the Constitution, in accordance with which they govern their state and their people; the countries carry out their inner and international policy within the frame of the Constitution, and this is one of the main principles of the Statehood. If the country violates its own Constitution it looses its authority in the international sphere as well as among its own people.

Unfortunately the Chinese Communist Government has been violating this principle over last 50 years. If we just look at the contradictory harmful policy of the Communist China towards the religion in Eastern Turkestan, we can clearly see how the Chinese rule is unreliable, false and mean, as well as how it violates its own Constitution. For instance, clause #36 of the "Constitution of the People's Republic of China" says: "The citizens of People's Republic of China has freedom of religious faith. No one governmental organ, social organization or individual must be forced to believe or not, and all citizens regardless of their attitude to religion, must be treated equally. The State protects the religion". Article #11 of the "Law of the national territorial autonomy of the People's Republic of China" repeats the article of the Constitution cited above, so both of these Laws guarantee the freedom of faith to the citizens.  Actually this clause of the principal laws of  China have never been implemented, it was written to bluff the world only. Though the Constitution of the People's Republic of China still contains this clause, actually the Chinese Government has been denying it by passing a series of the decrees, acts and other documents. As far as Eastern Turkestan concerns, at present the Chinese Government has passed a lot of official edicts, decrees, regulations and other documents to  abolish the religion and to limit the religious activities of the people. Among such regulations the main is "The temporary regulations on control of the religious meetings in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region" containing of 23 clauses, which has been passed on November 9, 1988 and was the beginning of the political control of the mosques, "medreses", Muslim schools. On August 23, 1999 two regulations have been passed - that of "Temporary edict on control over the religious activities in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region" (22 clauses) and that of the "Temporary edict on the punishment of the worshiping officials in Xinjang Uygur Autonomous Region" (10 clauses). These edicts banned the collective worships of the Muslims in Eastern Turkestan,  and proclaimed the campaign of "Cleaning", i.e. dismissing the patriot  Muslim priests of the mosques under different pretexts, and appointing
instead those Muslim priests who keep loyalty to the Chinese regime. The anti-religion measures have been strengthened by passing the "Regulations on the religious activities in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region" of 33 clause passed on June 16, 1994 by The Permanent Committee of the People Congress of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. The secret "Document #7" of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China adopted in 1996 was the records of the meeting of the Permanent Committee of the Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party held in Beijing in 1996 and devoted to the situation in Eastern Turkestan. Everybody knows that all Chinese leaders used everywhere the expression "the national separatism is the main danger for Xinjiang ". As far as I know, this was a "creation" of the bloody executioner Wang Enmao. The Central Chinese Government has enriched this expression in the "document #7" by clarifying "At present the main dangers for Stability in Xinjiang are national separatism and unlawful religious activities". By this it makes clear that the goal of the Chinese rule is open striking on sacred Muslim religion and its final liquidation. On December 2 of the same year the "Party Committee of the Autonomous Region" together with the "Committee on Nations' religious issues of the Autonomous Region" has announced the joint document called "On the restrictions of unlawful religious activities". Afetr this document has been declared the police intensified and widened the mass arrests of the religious figures, beating and killing them. Having formed the special "Offices of centralization and regulation" the Chinese authorities put strict restrictions on worship of the Uygurs working for the governmental organizations. For instance the issue #19 of the "Bulletin of centralization and regulation" published by the "Hotan Office of centralization and regulation" on 7 August 1997 published information under the title "All teacher of the System of Education who believe in religion have been strictly investigated". According to that information all teachers in the Hotan district, which worship or have gone to Mecca were dismissed and expelled from the schools. Another example is the document #25 for internal use distributed by the  Urumchi cable television station in 1996. It stated: "all employees are strictly banned to worship and participate in religious activities, otherwise they will be discharged". All this shows that the Chinese government is openly propagating the atheism among the poplulation and has strictly restricted the freedom of religion in Eastern Turkestan. Such situation is common for all Eastern Turkestan. It is obvious that this contradicts the Constitution and the "Law on National Territorial Autonomy". If before the Communist regime controlled only the members of the Communist Party on the religious matter, now it started striking on the religious belief of the whole population by organizing the special groups of 10 families in the villages and forcing them to watch each other and control every family. The most pitiful point is that even the words of the Constitution that "all citizens have freedom of religious faith" became the "crime" for the Government. For example, when Abdu Jelil Emet, a young religious activist, who is now a member of the executive committee of the "European Unity of Eastern Turkestanians", living in Eastern Turkestan appealed to the Chinese government demanding of respect the freedom of religion granted by the Constitution of China, he has been arrested, put to prison and tortured. All this demonstrates that the Chinese government has never observed and respected its own Constitution. It is obvious that the State that does not respect its own Constitution will never respect and observe the international laws. In this case we have the only option to survive that is the independence of Eastern Turkestan and self-government.  The historical past of last 50 years has taught us that this was our only choice!

© Uygur.Org  20/11/2001 04:40 A.Karakash