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China's Report on Xinjiang
Region Questioned
Stephanie Mann
29 May 2003
Washington - China, Russia, and four Central Asian
nations have ended a two-day summit in Moscow,
pledging to strengthen their cooperation in combating
terrorism, separatism, and extremism. The group,
called the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, decided
to set up a regional anti-terrorist center in the
Kyrgyz capital. Some observers say that for China, the
Central Asian group is a way to coordinate efforts to
stop separatist activity in its western region of
Xinjiang.
Just before this week's meeting of Central Asian
leaders in Moscow, the Chinese government issued a
report about Xinjiang, a predominantly Muslim area in
western China populated by diverse ethnic groups. It
provides a long description of the region's history
and economic development.
The document says Xinjiang has been part of China
since ancient times. It says for the past decade,
ethnic Uighurs who advocate the territory's
independence under the name East Turkistan have used
terrorist violence to try to achieve their goal. The
Chinese report says the separatists are influenced by
religious extremism and international terrorism, use
the banner of human rights and religious freedom, and
fabricate claims that China is oppressing ethnic
minorities.
Stanley Toops, a professor of geography at Miami
University of Ohio, is a specialist on the Xinjiang
region. He says China wanted to establish its position
on Xinjiang in advance of President Hu Jintao's trip
to Russia. Professor Toops says China changed its
characterization of the unrest in Xinjiang after the
September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United
States.
"Since 9-11, I think the People's Republic of China
has utilized the anti-terrorism rhetoric of other
countries, Russia and the United States as well, to in
some ways legitimate the activities of the state
within East Turkistan, within Xinjiang," he said. "In
China's case, to look at where terrorism exists, they
will point out places like Tibet or Xinjiang. But I
think it's difficult to call people there terrorists."
The president of the Uighur American Association, Alim
Seytoff, says he was surprised that China would issue
a report specifically on Xinjiang. He says China
apparently wants to gain international support for its
claim to Xinjiang.
"We assume that China is trying to justify its
illegitimate occupation of this country by citing
distorted historical accounts and by saying this
territory belonged to China since ancient times,
without any clarification of the word 'ancient times,'"
he said. "And trying to justify its occupation and
trying to inform the world that the Uighur cause is
illegitimate, it is not a just cause, and the Uighur
demand is not in the context of international law."
Mr. Seytoff says Xinjiang, or East Turkistan, was
occupied over the centuries by the same groups that at
various times occupied China, such as the Mongols and
the Manchus. And he says it does not make sense for
today's People's Republic of China to claim the area
as part of communist China.
"It is more like the Mongolian government, today's
Mongolian goverment, claiming all the territories
occupied by the Mongol empire of Genghis Kahn as
historic Mongol territory since ancient times," he
said. "It is like today's Greek government claiming
all territories occupied by Alexander the Great as
part of Greece since ancient times. Or more like the
Turks claiming all the territories occupied by the
Ottomans as historically part of Turkey's territories.
It is the same thing that China is claiming."
A few days before the Moscow meeting, the Munich-based
East Turkistan National Congress, an umbrella
organization of Uighur groups in exile, sent a letter
to the presidents of Russia and the four Central Asia
countries. It urged them to raise the issue of human
rights abuses in Uighur areas of China.
Mr. Seytoff says he never expected that to happen,
because, in his words, the Shanghai group supports
China in suppressing the Uighurs. "Under Chinese
pressure, Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan and Uzbekistan have
been suppressing the Uighur dissidents in their
respective countries and sending them back," he said.
"They see the Uighur movement both in East Turkistan
and central Asia more as a destabilizing factor than
any kind of human rights issue."
Professor Toops agrees that other members of the
Shanghai Cooperation Organization do not see it in
their interest to call for an investigation of Chinese
human rights practices. "I think this Shanghai
Cooperation Organization is a way for those countries
to maintain the ties with China, perhaps gain some
economic benefit," he said. "That is really what they
are hoping for, and at the same time forestall any
kind of overt Chinese influence within the region."
Moreover, Professor Toops says, if there were an
investigation into human rights in Xinjiang, one might
then want to examine Russia's actions in Chechnya or
Uzbekistan's handling of Islamic insurgents.
Professor Toops says China's crackdown on Uighur
separatists has strengthened the resolve of Uighur
groups in exile. But he says the East Turkistan
activists do not have a figure such as the Dalai Lama,
a Nobel peace prize recipient who has been able to
attract worldwide interest in the Tibetan cause.
Alim Seytoff says China has lost the global public
relations battle over Tibet and is determined not to
lose international public opinion on Xinjiang.
"What China is trying to do is try to convince the
international community that Uighurs do not have a
legitimate case here unlike the Tibetans, because the
Tibetans have already proven they have a legitimate
case, and the international community already accepts
the claims made by the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan
government in exile," she said. "Whereas in the Uighur
case, we do not have that yet."
Two representatives of the Dalai Lama are currently
visiting China, the second such trip since last
September when Beijing and the Tibetan government in
exile re-established contact after a nine-year gap.
(c) 2003 Voice of America
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