Plight of the Uyghur
In 2017, I came across the word ‘Uyghur’ for the first time in an article published by the Foreign Policy magazine titled When Marx Meets Islam. I thought it would be interesting to gain insight to the treatment of Muslim ethnic minorities in communist China. To my surprise, the Chinese communists’ approach towards religion seemed innocuous, or so I thought. It was in the summer of 2019 that I realised the article I read is too subtle and does not represent the contemporary condition of Muslim minorities in China. What brought me to this realisation was when I stumbled upon a documentary on the true nature of the events occurring in China’s western autonomous province of Xinjiang. A journalist was brave enough to surreptitiously sneak a camera into this dystopia of surveillance nightmare. After further research, I discovered other furtive attempts by journalists and rights groups to unravel the truth about the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s ruthless policies on the Uyghur people living in Xinjiang.
Who are the Uyghur? They are a Turkic people who have occupied the steppes of central Asia since antiquity. Their history and culture dates back more than 2,000 years ago. The Uyghur had been reluctant allies of different Chinese dynasties. They converted to Islam in the 10th century. In 1760, the Chinese empire under the Manchu Qing dynasty annexed East Turkestan and in 1884 officially named it Xinjiang; which literally translates to "new frontier". There were several unsuccessful Uyghur revolts against the Chinese Empire. In 1949, the CCP defeated the Nationalists in the Chinese civil war and forcefully incorporated Xinjiang into communist China.
Although they make up the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang, the Uyghur are not the only ethnic minority living there; Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Hui and etc are Muslim majority ethnicities that make up the rest of the population. The population of Han Chinese immigrants in Xinjiang has increased exponentially. The Han are the dominant ethnic group in China; they represent about 90% of the entire Chinese population. Han Chinese form 45% of Xinjiang's inhabitants today; some 8 million of them. Since 1949, Beijing has sought to settle as many Han as possible in the region in order to dilute the Uyghur population and possibly sinicise them.
In July 2009, two Uyghur factory workers were killed after they were accused of sexually harassing a Han female colleague. This incident created ethnic tensions that quickly escalated into riots that spiralled across major cities and towns in Xinjiang. Troops were deployed to quell the riots. The true casualty figures may never be known due to the lack of an independent oversight.
The CCP’s brutal crackdown after the riots saw many Uyghurs incarcerated; some were executed. This action further emboldened Uyghur separatist groups that were initially unorganised and posed a minor threat to the Communist Party in Xinjiang. In 2014, these groups carried out uncoordinated attacks at a train station and in government buildings, killing over 70 people and injuring many. The chairman of the CCP, Xi Jinping, who was in Xinjiang on a campaign to exhort the Uyghur against separatist agitations weeks after the separatists' attacks, laid down grounds for another brutal crackdown.
In a series of reforms to suppress separatist sentiment, Beijing installed a new governor in Xinjiang. Chen Quanguo is an extremist Party loyalist. He brought along his hard line aggressive policing techniques that he pioneered as governor of Tibet, another restive region in China.
Using advanced surveillance technology, the CCP has rounded up more than 1.5 million Muslims in Xinjiang and imprisoned them in internment camps across the region. Draconian laws have been instated; things as trivial as wearing a beard, saying "salam" to a friend, not eating pork, owning a copy of the Quran etc could land a person in any of these internment camps regardless of age, gender or education. Children taken to these camps are brainwashed into total submission to the Communist Party and its ideals, basically turning them into atheists. The elderly are tortured into renouncing their faith and forced to drink alcohol. There are sickening reports of young women being gang raped in the camps and forceful abortions and sterilisation are carried out on the Uyghur women rendering them barren. Over 8,500 mosques have been demolished or turned into bars and clubs; some of which were centuries old. Even cemeteries that contained the graves and tombs of Uyghur ancestors have been completely obliterated.
The deafening silence from the Muslim world has been pathetic. Of the 57 Muslim majority countries, none have spoken up against the execrable treatment of the Uyghur by the Chinese government. Recent reports have shown that some Muslim countries have connived with China to deport Uyghurs that were able to escape the notorious crackdown. Countries such as Turkey, where many Uyghur fled to seek refuge in the land of their fellow Turkic cousins. The report shows that Turkey deported many Uyghurs through Turkmenistan (another Muslim Turkic country) back to China to face torture. Saudi Arabia also deported some Uyghur asylum seekers after China requested it.
One may begin to wonder why Muslim countries are silent or even conniving in the torture and persecution of their Muslim brethren. The answer is not something easy to delineate. The closest one can explain this betrayal is to say that Muslims have been kicked so many times and they have become emasculated to the point they find this strategy of obsequiously surrendering to the pressure of the rest of the world appealing.
While the communists exert their power by demolishing mosques and erecting statues of Mao which have become ugly excrescence on the face of the cities of Xinjiang, the Uyghur are left in a dilemma; stabbed in the back by those they call brothers in faith who have abandoned and forsaken them in their plight, who should they turn to?
In the words of the poet "O you in the land of the oppressed, this is your test, God’s help is near; for indeed every tyrant has his time, even the Pharaoh was brought to his knees for his crimes and they can never take away your imaan it’s from the Rahman He gave you the Quran..." with this, I end with verses from the Quran;
Allah ﷻ says "[It is He] who created death and life to test you [as to] which of you is best in deed" 67:2
"Do the people think that they will be left to say, 'we believe' and they will not be tested?" 29:2
"For indeed with hardship will be ease, indeed with hardship will be ease" 94:5-6
"Allah does not burden a soul except [with that] within its capacity" 2:28
