Uyghurs mark 15th anniversary of China's Urumqi massacre
The WUC has organised various events to honour the victims of China’s most violent crackdown against the Muslim minority. Activist denounces policies that result in “crimes against humanity and genocide.” No Muslims from Xinjiang has been allowed to join the Hajj. Sinicisation and re-education camps have been set up for the Eid holiday.
Urumqi (AsiaNews) – The World Uyghur Congress (WUC) is marking today the 15th anniversary of the Urumqi massacre, with a ceremony to commemorate the victims of the violent crackdown carried out by Chinese forces against thousands of peaceful demonstrators.
On 5 July 2009, Uyghurs took to the streets in downtown Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Region, on their way to People's Square, to demonstrate against the Chinese government's handling of the Shaoguan incident in which some Uyghurs were killed during a brawl with Chinese workers.
The massacre was one of the “darkest episodes in the history of the Uyghur people,” said WUC President Dolkan Isa in a statement. “The Chinese government’s harsh crackdown on the protest marked a pivotal turning point, intensifying the repression of the Uyghur people and resulting in the current genocide.”
To commemorate the Urumqi massacre and demand an end to ongoing human rights violations, various exiled Uyghur groups organised a series of protests today.
In particular, the WUC called for demonstrations as a show of solidarity with the Uighur ethno-religious minority in northwestern China, stressing Beijing's direct responsibility for the persecution.
According to the WUC, the international community’s failure to vet the Chinese government’s actions allows for the continued implementation of policies that perpetrate crimes against humanity and genocide in East Turkistan.
This was clear at the Universal Periodic Review by the UN Human Rights Council, with China indignantly rejecting Western recommendations on human rights, saying that some of the them were “politically motivated”
Ethnic Uyghurs, who are Turkic-speaking Muslims living in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, complain of linguistic, cultural, and religious repression by China.
Over the years several violent clashes have occurred. Beijing claims that Islamic extremists seeking independence operate in the region; local activists accuse the Chinese authorities of deliberately provoking ethnic tensions through excessive control and "racist" policies against Uyghurs.
The most serious episode was on 5 July 2009, which was followed by months of harsh repression, including sentencing some Uyghurs to death for their role in the unrest.
Fifteen years ago, on this day, peaceful protests in Urumqi turned into interethnic clashes between Muslims and Han Chinese. Eventually, Chinese police and military cracked down and arrested thousands of people.
Uyghurs accuse Han Chinese of colonising them, taking over all the levers of power in the economy and public administration.
The aforementioned riot was the most violent recorded in the history of the region in western China. Beijing has used violence to quell the clashes, which left almost 200 people dead and 1,700 injured, and has reinforced its military presence in the area.
In the weeks that followed the original unrest, the authorities arrested 1,400 Uyghurs, blamed for the protests. Locals, for their part, say that the number of people arrested was far higher, at least 20,000, with police grabbing people in the streets only because they were in the streets, without any explanation.
One of the people who spoke out again the repression was Rebiya Kadeer, a Uyghur leader imprisoned for years in China for crimes of opinion and forced into exile in the United States.
She has rejected Chinese claims that terrorists were involved in the protest, emphasising the "peaceful" nature of dissent.
“China has no right to talk of 'terrorist attacks', until it allows its citizens freedom of speech and assembly,” she said at the time. Likewise, “China should cease arbitrary detention, unfair executions and torture in prison.”
There is a clear religious aspect to the persecution of Uyghurs; in fact, Uyghur Muslims have not been able to perform the Hajj, the major pilgrimage to Makkah, for years.
The Islamic Association of China and Uyghurs living abroad say that Chinese authorities have not granted any travel permit to Uyghur or Xinjiang Muslims to go to Saudi Arabia this year, while 769 pilgrims from Gansu and 284 from Yunnan were allowed to travel for the pilgrimage, one of Islam’s five pillars. The last time a Uyghur took part in the event was in 2016.
Last month, for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, [*]police and security forces set up "re-education" camps in Xinjiang, forcing Uyghurs to watch communist-themed films; they also visited Uyghur homes to make sure no one was engaged in Muslim religious activities
It is apparent that Beijing is trying to weaken Uyghur ethnic and religious identity and boost their loyalty to the Chinese state and the Communist Party.
For Erkin Ekrem, WUC vice president and professor at Hacettepe University in Ankara (Turkey), “It looks like they are trying to sinicize Eid.”
[*] Feast of Sacrifice.
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