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China bans Islamic group in Xinjiang,
arrests 179
AFP, BEIJING
Aug 19: China has banned a branch of Islam in its
Muslim-dominated Xinjiang region and arrested 179
followers, saying it "poisons" people's minds, a
rights group and state media said Friday.
Authorities in the Yili Autonomous Prefecture
announced that the Sala religion-a Chinese branch of
Islam-has been banned because of its dangerous
doctrines, according to the German-based World Uighur
Congress.
The religious group was accused of misleading ordinary
people with its "pseudo-science" and "anti-society"
doctrines, said the Yili Daily, quoting the Yili
prefecture government. Zhang Yun, who is in charge of
supervising the prefecture's religious affairs, warned
government and communist party officials of the "dangerous"
nature of Sala and said it had be to banned along with
other illegal religions, the report said. "In recent
years, the 'Sala' religion has spread in some parts of
the prefecture. It poisoned the minds of and deceived
... believers, incited worship of their religious
leader," the government was quoted as saying.
Followers were accused of illegal gatherings,
illegally collecting money, obstructing government
control on religious affairs and endangering social
stability, it said.
Some of those arrested have since been freed after
paying fines although many others remain in custody,
said congress spokesman Dilxat Raxit.
Yili prefecture officials refused to comment while the
Xinjjiang Religious Affairs Bureau denied Sala existed
in the region.
"Xinjiang does not have the Sala religion, there is no
question about whether it is a cult or not," the
director of the bureau said, declining to give his
name.
Dilxat said he was outraged by the repression and said
the crackdown undermined religious freedom in Xinjiang,
or East Turkestan as Turkic- speaking Uighurs who live
in the area prefer to call it.
"I was shocked at China's crackdown on Muslim
religions," he said.
Sala was founded in the 1930s in northwest China's
Qinghai province and spread among Muslims in
neighbouring Xinjiang and other nearby areas such as
Ningxia and Gansu, Dilxat said. Xinjiang has been
autonomous since 1955 but continues to be the subject
of crackdowns by Chinese authorities, who have been
accused by rights groups of religious repression
against Uighurs in the name of counter-terrorism
efforts.
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