|
After terrorist
attacks of September 11, the USA and Western countries
announced that “the Islamic terrorism” and “the Islamic
radicalism” are major causes of the threat to democracy
and global peace. A good illustration to this approach
is creation of the alliance among the Western nations
under leadership of the US in the all-out fight against
the “Islamic radical groups” and “the global terrorism”
by military, financial, diplomatic and other means. The
US led military actions in Afghanistan and international
actions toward implementing tighter financial control
express this attitude quite vividly.
Even though the Islamic world accused of terrorism has
actually stood against the “Islamic terrorism”, the West
insist that the radicalism and backwardness in the
Islamic world cause the threat to peace and stability
worldwide. From Islamic world’s point of view, terrorism
has no relation to the faith and religion and terrorism
cannot really be associated with any religion.
The terrorism nowadays is rooted not only in the Islamic
world but also in other civilizations and religions. The
basic tenets of Islam are peace, mercy, compassion and
pursuit of knowledge – and the terrorism which causes
suffering to innocent people is not associated with and
could not be related to Islam at all.
This is the reason why we do oppose associating the
Islamic civilization with the “Islamic terrorism”.
However, it is true somehow that a certain level of
backwardness in the Islamic world brings to the scene
the radical movements, and that these radical groups not
only stain the image of Muslims but also pose a threat
the world peace and stability.
It is true that extremism and prejudice in the Islamic
world have their adherents and followers among the
illiterate or poorly educated people. Such people from
the Muslim background have a distorted knowledge and
vision of Islam which symbolizes peace and tolerance.
The situation in Afghanistan under the rule of anarchist
regime and the fight of the Taliban regime against
education and progress serves a is clear evidence of
such attitudes among some Muslims. From this point of
view, we Eastern Turkistanis, have clearly expressed our
views to the whole world about the events of September
11.
But there is another side of the coin, exactly it is has
become apparent the September 11 events gave a chance to
the present fascist, communist and totalitarian regimes
to oppress and deprive of religious freedom the Muslims
who live in such countries and who have no relation with
the global terrorism.
For example, there is only one Islamic institute in
Eastern Turkistan, and this institute was established in
80s under the auspices of international organizations,
with the aim of teaching Uighur religious students and
meeting the strong desire of Uighurs for religious
guidance and education.
Unfortunately, the Communist Chinese authorities since
the establishment of this institute ordered this
Institute to teach the students atheism and communist
ideology and created obstacles in any possible way to
them in acquiring the true knowledge of Islam.
Presently the only “Xinjiang Islamic Institute” found by
the government is facing the threat of being closed. The
main reason is the strengthening oppression in recent
years of the Uighurs, and the government’s deliberate
policy of controlling and intervening in the religious
affairs of the said institute.
A certain part of students and professors were accused
falsely of “ illegal religious activities”, and more
specifically, in “the participation in the religious
organization” and they eventually were arrested.
The school’s curriculum consists mainly of courses like
“history of the Chinese Communist Party” , “history of
Xinjiang province” , “Marxism against the religion”,
“works of Deng Xiaopin” and similar programs. Surely,
such “study courses” are not related to the objectives
of the religious school. This “teaching’ is actually
directed against the religious education system.
As a result, the school had turned in the place of
spreading pro-government propaganda instead of teaching
the foundations of religion. Two famous professors,
Muhemmet Abdullah Hajim and Yusup Hajim were falsely
accused of “anti- government activities”, and in October
2000 they were arrested. Well-known rector of the
institute and a religious scholar Muhemmet Salih Damolla
hajii was forced to retire.
The teaching process eventually became meaningless,
everything was under control, and religious education
was practically non-existent, so the students who failed
to acquire true religious knowledge decided “not to
waste time” and left the school.
So, as a result of the oppression of religion by the
Chinese authorities and intervening in the religious
affairs, the one and only religious school in Eastern
Turkistan, “Xinjang Islamic Institute” faced serious
troubles.
Sixth, the Chinese government is eradicating in a
systematic way all religious materials and closing all
religious centers.
The Chinese government, ever since its ruling in Eastern
Turkistan, always announced that It asked financial
sources for building mosques , in fact all mosques were
built by the local believers. However, the Chinese
authorities provoked situation under any false reasons
and did everything possible to destroy and shut down the
mosques and to turn them in administrative buildings.
More specifically, according to our correspondent
Abdullah Pamir, on October 9 the office of religious
affairs of the Hotan Qaraqash district, municipal office
and administration of the city market organized over 100
secret agents to destroy the “Dong Mosque” where more
than 10 thousand Muslims usually congregated, on the
pretext that its was located too close to the primary
school.
Seventh, the Chinese communist authorities have
restricted the right of students to study abroad, to
attend universities in Muslim countries, they have
interrogated and punished such people, deliberately did
not employ people who studied abroad, and took similar
measures, and generally created obstacles to Uighurs
studying abroad.
In recent years, the communist Chinese government
persecuted Uighur students who studied in Pakistan,
Turkey, Egypt and other Muslim countries. Because of
that the students studying abroad could not return home,
and they were forced in exile in foreign land. Only In
Germany over 20 young graduates of the Egyptian, Turkish,
and Pakistani universities have claimed political asylum.
The Chinese government also attempts to eliminate the
education system of Uighurs. As a result
of such fascist actions young Uighurs remain illiterate
and poorly educated.
So, the current situation in Eastern Turkistan
demonstrates that the ultimate goal of the Chinese
government is to deprive Uighur Muslims of religious
knowledge and science, to force them into the state of
backwardness, and radicalism; and basically to distort
the image of peaceful Uighurs Muslims in the world
community’s perceptions. If the world community
continues to stay numb and indifferent to the situation
in Eastern Turkistan, in the future the power of
backward, illiterate and distant from true Islam
radicals may arise, and such power may cause similar
threats to the global peace as the Taliban regime did.
At the end we would like to draw attention of the world
community to the fact that the Chinese Communist regime
has used a “fight against global terrorism” as an excuse
to claim the Eastern Turkistan Muslims who fight against
the Communist Chinese regime to be “a part of
international terrorism”, and by doing so they attempt
to associate Uighur Muslims with the global terrorism.
But the history of Uighurs testifies how distant were
Uighur Muslims from terrorism and radicalism. Since
converting into Islam in the 10th century and up to now,
there has never been any conflicts or hostile actions
taken against adherents of various religious creeds.
There has never been Taliban type radicalism in this
region.
What is more, since the 19th century Ughurs under
Chinese-Manzhur rule rebelled several times and created
two independent states (in 1933 and 1944). Uighurs have
never stopped this strife for national liberation. We
would like to stress that the organizations fighting for
independence of Eastern Turkistan clearly stated that
they were national liberation movement, not religious
organizations.
That is why the Chinese authorities have always labeled
that these movements as “nationalistic rebellions”. But
after events of September 11, Chinese authorities have
changed their stance and called Eastern Turkistan
liberation front “terrorist organization”, and used the
present situation of the world community’s fight against
terrorism, and attempted to mix Uighurs with terrorists.
The Chinese authorities tried to present the certain
cases of personal revenge and the fact that few Uighurs
fled to Afghanistan as a proof that the whole Eastern
Turkistan liberation movement is in fact “ a terrorist
organization”. By doing so the Chinese rulers attempt to
hide the fact of its half a century long fascist and
oppressive ruling in this part of the world.
However, since the Chinese Communist government came to
power in 1949 about one thousand rebellions took place,
and there were few cases of bombing attacks with the
total number of innocent victims counting to no more
than 10 individuals.
These bombing actions were separate actions of Uighur
individuals who revenged against the brutal oppression.
These actions do not have anything in common with
national liberation movement of Eastern Turkistan.
Such cases of revenge were reported not only in Eastern
Turkistan, but also in America and other Western
countries.
Regarding the Uighur militant forces in Central Asia and
Afghanistan, the “Shanghai Forum” organization, built
under leadership of China, has issued in 1996 a secret
“resolution 7” regarding oppression of the Uighur
national liberation movement. After 1996 Chinese
communist regime has taken actions against Uighurs
inside and outside China, and such persecutions caused
actions of bombing. Several incidents of military
actions were reported in western part of Eastern
Turkistan, Hotan, Kashgar and in the northern Ili region.
The events of “February 5” , 1997 in Gulja serve as
another illustration.
According to our information, over 5000 Eastern
Turkistanis fled to countries of central Asia, and among
them were the members of the national forces chased by
the government authorities, young religious scholars,
etc.
The Eastern Turkistan organizations abroad have
submitted the situation of these political refugees to
the UN High Commission of Refugees, International
Amnesty, and
Demanded granting them political asylum. Unfortunately,
international organizations underestimated the issue of
Uighur political refugees. As far as we know, so far
over 5000 political refugees claimed saylum, among them
over 20 were refused asylum in Europe. The rest were
forced to go in exile to Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan,
Pakistan, Iran, Turkey Uzbekistan and other countries.
But the communist Chinese regime did not leave these
political refugees in peace. China applied diplomatic
pressure on Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan, Pakistan and other
countries to return some political refugees to China.
Besides, the Chinese authorities sent to these countries
the killers with weapons , threatened them, persecuted
their relatives in home country, and took similar
measures.
Because of such persecutions some refugees hiding in
Central Asian regions took weapons and were forced to
fight the Chinese hitmen. Several cases of shootings
were reported happened. In 1998 the Kazakhstan
authorities turned in to Chinese government Hemit
Muhemmet along with 3 other Uighur political asylum
seekers and that later Chinese government sentenced all
of them to death.
The refugees in Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan and Pakistan had
no choice but to join anarchist regime of Afghanistan
and to seek asylum there. But there is no evidence that
some member of Eastern Turkistan forces came to
Afghanistan to join Taliban army and to gain military
experience, that they accepted Taliban ideology, even if
a couple of Uighurs were members of Al-Qaida this fact
does not allow anyone to confuse all Eastern Turkistan
liberation movement with Taliban or Al-Qaida.
There is no reason whatsoever to announce the Uighur
organizations abroad which lead peaceful actions and
abide by international laws to call them as “linked with
terrorists” as Chinese government claims, to deprive
them of support and financial backup.
As we said above, in Central Asian countries, In
particular in Afghanistan, Uighur refugees
Present caused by attitudes of international
organizations to brutal oppression by Chinese government
the national liberation movement.
In conclusion, we would like to mention that the Chinese
rulers execute oppressive police towards Eastern
Turkistan in order to leave it underdeveloped. Such
attitude is a clear evidence that they wish to turn
Muslims in another Taliban regime. In this regard we
urge the international community and organizations to
take a sober stance towards Chinese policies of
suppressing cultural and national revival of Uighur
people and deprive Uighurs of human rights! We insist
there are no “radicals” and” terrorists” among the
Uighur national liberation movement members.
The Uighurs lead political and military fight in order
to use their legitimate right to determine its own
future. The national liberation movement struggles for
the human rights, for the right to live peaceful, decent
and prosperous lives!
With best regards,
Abdujelil Qaraqash
Eastern Turkistan Information Center Chairman,
2002 14 January, Munich, Germany |
