An electronic newsletter Produced by the Eastern Turkistan Information Center No: 21 19 February 1997 In this issue: (1) CHINESE LEADER DENG XIAOPING DIES
(2) DENG DIES
(3) REACTIONS TO EVENTS ON CHINESE BORDER WITH KAZAKSTAN.
(4) TURKEY APOLOGIZES TO CHINA OVER FLAG-BURNING INCIDENT
(5) UIGHUR PROTESTERS BURN CHINESE FLAGS IN TURKEY
(6) DENG'S HEALTH DETERIORATES SHARPLY
(7) UIGHURS MOBILISE AFTER BLOODY ETHNIC RIOTS IN CHINA
*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=
BEIJING -- Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, who opened China's economy to the world while maintaining strict ideological control, died Wednesday at age 92. China's state-run Xinhua News Agency said Deng died from complications from Parkinson's disease and a lung infection. Deng was the great reformer, the man who first initiated the process of change that swept the communist world. But, even when challenged in the streets, Deng never abandoned his commitment to Communist Party rule in China. (2) DENG DIES
China's paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, is dead at the age of 92 (born august 1904). He had been ill for several years. His passing was announced early Thursday morning (2:57 a-m) by China's official news agency. V-O-A's Gil Butler has more on the death of one of the most important leaders in modern Chinese history. Deng Xiaoping died of advanced Parkinson's disease and a lung infection after failing to respond to emergency treatment, according to Xinhua, the official Chinese news agency. He had been in failing health for years and had not been seen in public for three years. In recent days, unconfirmed reports had been circulating that the paramount leader was near death, but pfficial chinese spokesmen had said there was no great change in his condition. Attention inevitably focuses now on china after Deng. Analysts here differ on how surely president Jiang Zemin – Deng Xiaoping's anointed successor -- holds power. Some China-watchers say Mr. Jiang has moved adroitly and surely to solidify his position; others have expressed doubt and have predicted a power struggle after Deng Xiaoping's death. (3) REACTIONS TO EVENTS ON CHINESE BORDER WITH KAZAKSTAN.
Ethnic Uighurs residing in Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkey have harshly condemned Beijing's crack down on violent separatist riots among Uighurs in China's Xinjiang province in early February, according to Western media. Three Uighur exile groups based in Kazakstan, the United Association of Uighurs, the United National Revolutionary Front, and the Organization for Freedom of Uighuristan, have declared their intention to unite and form the Uighuristan movement. The groups also said on 14 February that contrary to official Chinese statements, the riots in Xinjiang have spread from the city of Yining to Kucha, Shaghiar, and Khotan. Three Uighur protest marches have taken place in Turkey over the past week, according to Turkish media reports. On 17 February, some 300 people, mainly ethnic Uighurs, picketed the Chinese Embassy in Bishkek, RFE/RL reported. An estimated 200,000 Uighurs reside in Kazakstan and 50,000 live in Kyrgyzstan. -- Lowell Bezanis (4) TURKEY APOLOGIZES TO CHINA OVER FLAG-BURNING INCIDENT
ISTANBUL- Turkey said Monday it had apologized to China over the burning of the Chinese flag by nationalists and ethnic Uighurs at the weekend in protests over Beijing's clampdown on Moslems in the northwestern Xinjiang province. But a foreign ministry statement said Turkey would maintain its "interest in the people of the Xinjiang region, given the cultural links between the Turkish people and ethnic Uighurs." Nearly 1,000 ethnic Uighurs and Turkish nationalists demonstrated here Sunday amid reports of the execution of Moslems following riots by separatist Turkic-speaking Uighurs against ethnic Chinese, which left scores of people dead. It was the second time in less than a week that Uighur protesters have burned Chinese flags in Istanbul. In Monday's communique the foreign ministry said Turkey was following events in Xinjiang with concern, and hoped for a "speedy return of peace and calm to the region." Foreign ministry spokesman Omer Akbel said "we have officially expressed our regret to the Chinese ambassador in Ankara and the Chinese government" over the flag-burning incident, in which demonstrators tore down the Chinese flag from the consulate in Istanbul and set it alight. The Uighur associations behind the rallies call Xinjiang East Turkistan and say more than 300,000 ethnic Uighurs have been living in Turkey since fleeing their homeland in the last few decades. Chinese diplomats protested against the previous demonstration last Monday and called on the Turkish authorities to take security measures around Chinese representations in Turkey. (5) UIGHUR PROTESTERS BURN CHINESE FLAGS IN TURKEY
ISTANBUL - Nearly 1,000 ethnic Uighurs and Turkish nationalists Sunday burned Chinese flags at a rally here in protest at what they called China's oppressive policies against Moslems. Witnesses said the Uighur demonstrators and supporters of nationalist Turkish parties chanted slogans against China and burned Chinese flags in the central Sisli district on Istanbul's European side. The demonstration came amid reports of execution of Moslems in the wake of riots by separatist Turkic-speaking Uighurs against ethnic Chinese, which had left scores of dead in violence in the northwestern Chinese province of Xinjiang. The protesters also sought to march toward the Chinese consulate in a nearby district but were stopped by police and had to disperse. The Uighur associations organising the rally call Xinjiang East Turkistan and say more than 300,000 ethnic Uighurs have been living in Turkey since fleeing their homeland in the last few decades. It was the second time in less than a week that Uighur protesters have burned Chinese flags in Istanbul. Chinese diplomats protested against the previous demonstration last Monday and called on the Turkish authorities to take security measures around Chinese representations in Turkey. (6) DENG'S HEALTH DETERIORATES SHARPLY
BEIJING- The health of ailing Chinese patriarch Deng Xiaoping has worsened suddenly in the past few days, French businessmen said here Saturday, quoting sources close to Deng. The 92-year-old paramount leader's health declined sharply Thursday afternoon, the businessmen said, after a meeting with members of Deng's entourage. The report came as the Hong Kong-based Apple Daily newspaper quoted sources as saying Deng had been hospitalized in Beijing after suffering a massive stroke earlier in the week, which had been preceded by a milder stroke. The businessmen, requesting anonymity, said a Deng confidant whom they were meeting was called to the telephone and informed that the patriarch had been taken ill Thursday afternoon. The confidant turned pale and hurried out of the room, the businessman said. Apple Daily, quoting sources in Beijing, said Deng was in hospital under observation following a brain hemorrhage. Deng was intially hospitalised before the Lunar New Year holidays, which started February 7, after suffering a minor stroke but was later released and was well enough to meet guests at home over the holiday period, although he had a cold, the report said. A spokesman for China's Foreign Ministry, however, told a Hong Kong television station late Friday that "there is not much change" in the health of the architect of China's economic reforms, which began in 1979. Reports on Deng's health have regularly shaken Hong Kong stock markets. The latest rumors caused local stock prices to slump 1.7 percent Thursday and a further 1.0 percent Friday. The key barometer, the Hang Seng Index, lost 126.69 points to finish at 13,113.26 Friday. But traders said investors were using the excuse of Deng's failing health to take profits after the index hit an all-time closing high of 13,868.24 on January 20. The latest report raising questions about Deng's health came as the Chinese leadership ended a campaign eulogizing the work of the reform architect. Chinese television last month showed a 12-part series that sparked a series of rumors of his imminent demise. The year began with fresh speculation about Deng's health triggered by a Hong Kong press report that he had lapsed into a coma and had been rushed to a Beijing military hospital. On January 7, the foreign ministry sought to quell the rumors by stressing there had been "no major change" in the patriarch's physical condition. Deng was last seen in public during the February 1994 Lunar New Year celebrations, looking frail and disorientated. Although his health has been a source of frequent speculation for years, family members continue to insist he will realise his ambition of seeing Hong Kong return to Chinese sovereignty on July 1 this year. In one of several incidents that blemished his reputation as economic savior and highlighted his authoritarian nature, he ordered troops into Tiananmen Square to crush pro-democracy protests in June 1989. After retiring from his last official post in March 1990, Deng made few public appearances but was at the time still regarded as the supreme arbiter of important decisions. With one visit to China's booming coast in early 1992, he jumpstarted economic reforms that had marked time since 1989. In October the same year, he had his theories enshrined in the party constitution, paving the way for China's shift to a "socialist market economy." (7) UIGHURS MOBILISE AFTER BLOODY ETHNIC RIOTS IN CHINA
ALMATY - Up to 100 people may have died in recent clashes between Uighur separatists and Chinese security forces at Yining in the northwestern Chinese province of Xinjiang bordering Kazakhstan, a young refugee from the region told Uighur exiles here. Around 300 exiles chanting "Allahu Akbar" gave a hero's welcome on Friday to the newsest arrival, Aablat who said riots had spread from Yining - a town about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the border - to other provincial towns. "On February 4 and 5, the Chinese arrested about 1,000 students. On the fifth, the demonstrations began," he told a group of Uighur mullahs and 300 other refugees at a meeting in a building in Almaty. He said the 1,000 students had been detained after publicly criticising a Chinese government decision to appoint the mullahs through administrative channels. The Chinese authorities fear the development of a "parallel" militant Islam in Xinjiang where the population is overwhelminly Moslem. On February 6, "in the Dal Makhala district of Yining, the Chinese arrested 31 demonstrators. They executed them that same day and on the 7th. Among them were 12 women aged betwen 15 and 26," Ablat said. Ethnic riots erupted in Yining on February 7 and continued until the 11th leaving dozens of dead, both Uighur and Chinese, according to Ablat who put the number of dead at between 80 and 100. He said rioting was still going on when he left, in the towns of Kucha south of Yining, Shaghiar near Kuchma and Khotan about 1,000 kilometres (450 miles) from Urumqi. Ablat carried a letter from the so-called "patriots of Kulja" - the Uighur name for Yining. "Listen to the voice of your oppressed people. We are ready to give millions of our lives for freedom even if nobody will help us," the letter said. Ablat, speaking in Uighur, a language akin to Turkish, said "on February 8, four Uighur combatants seized a stock of arms at Nilka (near the provincial capital Urumqi) but when they were surrounded by Chinese soldiers, they blew it up and themselves with it." After listening to Ablat's story, one mullah swore that "after the mourning period, we will avenge our brothers." An Uighur journalist in Almaty who attended the meeting told AFP that the three Uighur exile organisations in Kazakhstan had merged on February 8 to create a movement calling itself "Uighuristan". In the 1940s, a shortlived republic of eastern Turkistan was set up in Xinjiang but was crushed by the army of Mao Zedong in 1949. In 1962, at the height of tension between China and the then Soviet Union, thousands of Moslem Uighurs, Kazakhs and Kyrgyz fled over the border from China. Today about 200,000 Uighurs live in Kazakhstan. Prepared by: Abdulrakhim Aitbayev (rakhim@lochbrandy.mines.edu) WUNN newsletter index*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= The World Uyghur Network News electronic newsletter is produced by the Eastern Turkistan Information Center (ETIC) in cooperation with the Taklamakan Uighur Human Rights Association (USA), and is devoted to the current political, cultural and economic developments in Eastern Turkistan and to the Uyghur people related issues. Eastern Turkistan (Sherqiy Turkistan in Uyghur) is a name used by the indigenous people of the region for their motherland located in what is at present the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic China. The World Uyghur Network News brings information on situation in Eastern Turkistan from the Uyghur and other sources to the attention of the international community. *=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= EASTERN TURKISTAN INFORMATION CENTER |