Thoughts on Uyghur Muslims oppression
By: Samuel Chiang
Tags: Muslim, China, Oppression, Uyghur

The Human rights issue in Xinjiang has recently surfaced into the global media. The Chinese government has secretly oppressed the Uyghurs, aboriginal to the Chinese province of Xinjiang, through a series of political indoctrination and imprisoning as an attempt to assimilate the Uyghurs into Hans’ way of life. As a direct response to the Chinese government’s cultural oppression of Uyghurs’ way of life, several separatists groups like the East Turkestan Islamic Movement or ETIM were formed. The purpose of this entry is to discuss and analyze the causes of the Separatist movements and their connection with the Chinese government’s oppression through three significant aspects: Anti-Uyghur cultural measures imposed by the Chinese government, increasing paranoia on anti-terrorism acts, and the introduction of re-education camps.

The Chinese government inclines to assimilate minorities’ culture and to replace them with the Han culture. It is first demonstrated by China’s oppression on Tibetans from 1949 to early 2000s (Walker, 2016). According to the report released by Friends of Tibet, a non-profit organization that focuses on Human Rights issue in Tibet, after Chinese government violates the peace treaty signed between The Tibetan government and Chinese government, approximately 1.2 million Tibetans has lost their life under the occupation of the Chinese government (FoT 1994). Uyghur Muslims are facing a similar future. As they are still at the early stage of the oppression, Uyghurs lived in the state of Xinjiang are forbidden to practice their culture, language, religion, and any traditions that are not approved by the Chinese government. Reported by Human Rights Watch (2018), authorities restrict the Uyghurs to the state-approved patriotic set of ideas and social norms; one example is their banned of baby names that have a religious meaning or Islamic implication because they are “impure” and is against the indoctrination of the country. Those who do not obey are subject to criminal trials or inhuman treatments convicted under the labels of “separatism, terrorism, and extremism.” These examples of cultural purging create inhibited fear and anger among the Uyghurs population, forming separatist groups is one of the more direct ways a portion of the Uyghurs population demonstrated in order to win back control of the cultural aspect of their life. Unlawful trials also present to be a part of the cultural issue, as revealed by the case of Uyghur economist and famous separatist Ilham Tohti in September 2014. He was sentenced to life in prison for “separatism” and without any substantial shreds of evidence was sent to prison (HRW, 2018). Cases of imprisoning highly vocalize member representing the Uyghur society like that of Ilham Tohti’s case is another contributing factor to the separatist movement in Xinjiang, as these members are the one that is raising awareness and developing actionable plans, they usually are regarded very highly in the Uyghur society. Their imprisoning only raise more awareness and discontent, which ultimately leads to more separatism actions.

On top of indoctrination, the Chinese government also put in the effort to condemned Uyghurs’ images by broadcasting propaganda messages around China that justify their military operation by linking terrorism to supposedly violent separatist groups like ETIM. The propaganda creates hostility towards the Uyghurs population that allows the rest of the Chinese population to hate on the Uyghurs and to justify the persecution. (Kadeer, 2017). “Anti-terrorism measures” create constant fear into the heart of Uyghurs people as the government treats them as terrorists without any human rights (HRW 2018). An example will be the target profiling of “Muslim men who grow a long beard or woman in a black Abaya [robe-like dress]” for random searches as part of anti-terrorism attempt (Benbo, 2019). It connects to the Separatism movement as the target profiling is specifically conduct on the term for religious persecution as the government focus on Uyghurs with generic Muslim appearances that belong to a part of Uyghurs culture that the Separatists treasured. China’s anti-terrorism attempt also extends to the everyday life aspects of the Uyghurs living in Xinjiang, including their privacy. Examples of the common occurrence are instilling checkout counter in Uyghurs communities with iron bars cage to prevent “terrorism” and the surveillance power from encouraged neighbor spying (Bendo, 2019). The privacy intrusion from neighbors and the anti-terrorism measurements has to transform Xinjiang into a police state which further moves people into the idea of Separatism as a way to regain control of their livelihood.

In order to efficiently assimilate the entire Uyghurs population, the Chinese government constructed numbers of “re-education camp” that are purposed to teach the Uyghurs Mandarin and to instill the Communist government’s value into their mind. Each camp is designed to hold more than 100,000 detainees (Sudworth, 2018). To the Uyghurs who value their cultural heritage very highly, the blunt action of imprisoning assimilation from the Chinese government is ruthless and unethical. After experiencing the horrific situation in the camps, including examples like solitary confinement and physical punishments such as intentional starving (HRW, 2018), many released Uyghurs are inspired to join the Separatism movement.

In conclusion, the Separatism movement in Xinjiang is a result of the Chinese government’s blatant cultural assimilation, condemnation of the entire Uyghur population, and political/cultural indoctrination that involves unfair imprisoning of many Uyghurs. Despite the activists’ efforts to successfully create global awareness of the oppression, not many actionable plans have been proposed. Direct solutions proposed by Human Rights Watch (2018) such as, “sending peacekeeping force from the UN to guard the region” and indirect solution such as “raising awareness in the US to ultimately make the Counterterrorism Law consistent with international law to prevent injustice” (HRW, 2018), are some examples of solutions being evaluate at this current moment. However, if the situation in Xinjiang is getting out of control, the UN should interfere as it is a worldly recognized peacekeeping force. They will be the only suitable candidate, in this matter, to carry out the eradication of human rights issue that currently resides at Xinjiang area and to restore peace and security among the oppressed Uyghurs Muslims.