Ili Rebellion
In the 1940s around 9,000 Tajiks Sarikolis lived in Xinjiang while others moved to other Central Asian countries and provinces of China. During the Ili Rebellion from 1944 to 1949, Uyghur forces butchered the livestock of the Tajiks as they advanced south. The Soviet backed insurgents destroyed Tajik crops and acted aggressively against the Tajiks and Kirghiz of China.