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Uyghur News / Uyghur American Association

» China acts to ease Uighur tension - 04-July-2010
Article Link By Kathrin Hille in Urumqi Published: July 2 2010 19:35 Last updated: July 2 2010 19:35 China has installed a grassroots network of officials throughout Xinjiang, its predominantly Muslim north-west frontier region, to address social risks and spot early signs of unrest a year after bloody ethnic riots erupted in the provincial capital. Hundreds of cadres have been transferred from southern Xinjiang, the region’s poorest area, into socially unstable neighbourhoods of Urumqi, the capital, and tasked with helping Uighur families find jobs. They are also expected to assist other low-income groups in accessing government money, according to local officials. Last year’s unrest pitted the Turkic Uighurs, Xinjiang’s largest ethnic group, against migrants from other parts of China who are mostly Han, the country’s dominant group. The social programmes are the most concrete evidence so far of new policy measures following last year’s ethnic clashes, t

» Xinjiang one year on: the world "could do more" - 02-July-2010
Asia News 07/02/2010 13:05 Beijing (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The world "shows more attention to the Uyghur cause in China, but could do much more for us”, says Rebiya Kadeer, the Uyghur leader exiled in the United States to commemorate the first anniversary of one of the bloodiest ethnic riots to take place in the Asian country. Meanwhile, to control the situation, the central government has installed 40 thousand cameras in the provincial capital Urumqi. A year ago, in fact, an ethnic Uyghur Muslim community residing in the northern province of Xinjiang challenged the domination of central government in Beijing. During the clashes, according to official sources, 200 people were killed. A further 1,700 were wounded, while the number of arrests is unknown: according to dissident leader, there are tens of thousands detained. The Uyghur are not asking for independence from Beijing, but demand greater autonomy. Although Xinjiang - the dissidents call the region East Turkistan - is one

» New testimonies reinforce call for China to investigate Xinjiang riots... - 02-July-2010
Amnesty International 2 July 2010 Amnesty International has urged the Chinese government to launch an independent investigation into last year's riots in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, after new testimony obtained by the organization has cast further doubt on the official version of events. A new report, "Justice, justice": The July 2009 Protests in Xinjiang, China includes newly gathered testimonies from Uighurs who fled China after the unrest, which centred on Xinjiang's capital, Urumqi. Interviewees described unnecessary or excessive use of force, mass arrests, enforced disappearances, and torture and ill-treatment in detention that occurred on 5 July 2009 and during the ensuing government crackdown. "The official account leaves too many questions unanswered. How many people really died, who killed them, how did it happen, and why?" said Catherine Baber, Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific Deputy Director. Ahead of the 5 July anniversary, security in Xinjiang has been ti

» Can you hear us now? Uyghur report details Urumchi unrest and repression... - 02-July-2010
Demdigest July 1, 2010 A year on from the unrest in Urumchi that followed the violent suppression of an initially peaceful demonstration, human rights activists are calling on China to accept an independent international investigation into the events. A new report from the Uyghur Human Rights Project examines the unrest of July and September 2009 in Urumchi, East Turkestan’s regional capital (also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region). Drawing on eye-witness accounts, Can Anyone Hear Us? Voices From The 2009 Unrest In Urumchi details the security forces’ use of deadly live fire against Uyghur demonstrators on July 5, subsequent beatings and arbitrary detentions, and the communist authorities’ efforts to exacerbate tensions between the Uyghur and Han communities. Two eye-witnesses gave moving accounts of ferocious and arbitrary violence against innocent Uyghur civilians. One described seeing police handing out steel batons to Han mobs, confirming reports tha

» Uighur leader appeals to world year after unrest - 01-July-2010
Article Link By Shaun Tandon AFP 2010-07-01 WASHINGTON — One year since China's worst ethnic violence in decades, the exiled leader of the Uighur minority has seen a surge of global interest in her cause but says the world can do far more. Long an obscure issue to much of the world, the simmering resentment against Beijing's rule by the mostly Muslim Uighur community burst into the open in July last year as riots engulfed Urumqi, capital of the vast Xinjiang region. The violence catapulted into the spotlight Rebiya Kadeer, a department store tycoon turned activist. The 63-year-old mother of 11 spent years in a Chinese prison before she was allowed to go into exile in the United States in 2005. "I'm just an ordinary woman, yet the Chinese government is so fearful of what I say and do. That shows I stand for justice," Kadeer, her booming voice softened by a smile, told AFP in her tiny office in Washington. Since the unrest, Kadeer has become an itinerant traveler - and a top publi

» Can Anyone Hear Us? Voices From The 2009 Unrest In Urumchi - 01-July-2010
For immediate release July 1, 2010, 1:45 pm EST Contact: Uyghur American Association +1 (202) 535 0039 and +1 (202) 535 0018 A new report by the Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) examines the unrest that took place in July and September 2009 in Urumchi, the regional capital of East Turkestan (also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region or XUAR) through the accounts of Uyghur eyewitnesses. Can Anyone Hear Us? Voices From The 2009 Unrest In Urumchi also investigates the economic, social and political factors that set the context for the unrest, as well as the information lockdown that followed. Residents of Urumchi who spoke to UHRP have described witnessing security forces’ use of deadly live fire against Uyghur demonstrators on July 5, extensive beatings of Uyghurs by civilians in July and September and arbitrary detentions that have exacerbated the growing divide between the Uyghur and Han communities. The accounts provided to UHRP cast sufficient doubt on the Chinese

» China installs 40,000 security cameras in Urumqi - 01-July-2010
The Washington Post By CARA ANNA AP 2010-07-02 BEIJING — China has installed about 40,000 high-definition surveillance cameras in the western region of Xinjiang days before the one-year anniversary of the country's worst ethnic violence in decades. The security cameras with "riot-proof" protective shells will be monitored by police at more than 4,000 public locations, including on city streets and buses and in schools and shopping malls, city government spokesman Ma Xinchun said Friday. Long-simmering tensions between Xinjiang's minority Uighurs and majority Han Chinese migrants turned into open violence in the streets of Urumqi — the capital of the traditionally Muslim region — last July 5. The government says 197 people were killed. Beijing blamed overseas Uighur (pronounced WEE-gur) groups of plotting the violence, but exile groups denied it. The installation of thousands of surveillance cameras follows a crackdown on violent crime launched there last month, as we

» Kyrgyz and Uzbeks Turn Out to Vote for Stability - 30-June-2010
Eurasianet June 27, 2010 - 12:30pm by Joanna Lillis and David Trilling Just weeks after Kyrgyzstan's worst violence in the post-Soviet era, voters turned out in larger-than-expected numbers on June 27 to cast ballots in a constitutional referendum. Many voters said they yearned for a return of stability to Kyrgyzstan. Amid a general atmosphere of skepticism in the southern city of Osh, scene of worst interethnic fighting June 10-14, many ethnic Uzbeks defied expectations that they would stay away from the polls. Uzbeks appear to have suffered disproportionately during the violent clashes, in which hundreds were killed and hundreds of thousands driven from their homes. Roza Otunbayeva, the leader of the provisional government, visited Osh to cast her referendum ballot. "Quite a lot of people are saying that our country is on the brink of collapse," she said. "However, we, the citizens of the republic, will show the whole of the international community today that Kyrgyzstan is unified a

» Zardari to visit China during joint military excercise; nuke deal likely... - 30-June-2010
Times of India Saibal Dasgupta, TNN, Jun 29, 2010, 06.55pm IST BEIJING: Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari is visiting Beijing during the joint military exercise between China and his country on the Muslim dominated border region of Ningxia early next month. During the visit, Zardari is likely to push Chinese leaders to take a final decision on the propose sale of nuclear power reactors. Going by remarks by the Chinese foreign ministry on Tuesday, he is pretty close to achieving his goal while offering to help China curb Uighur separatists in the China-Pakistan border region. Beijing is simultaneously wooing the Pakistani government and wooing fundamentalists forces like Jamat-e-Islami for this purpose. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said his country's civilian nuclear cooperation with Pakistan is not aimed at any third country. Sino-Pakistan cooperation is in line with international non-proliferation regime, he said. But Qin did not reply a question on whether Beijing

» US & China play 'chicken' in the Yellow Sea - 30-June-2010
Indian Express C. Raja Mohan Posted: Wed Jun 30 2010, 16:16 A first rate crisis is brewing in and around the Korean Peninsula that may well come to a head this week. The escalation of military tensions in the Yellow Sea that separates the Korean Peninsula from the Chinese mainland is likely to take two pathways - one originating in Pyongyang and the other in Beijing - or both. As Washington and Seoul respond with diplomatic and military measures to the alleged sinking of a South Korean naval ship, 'Cheonan', at the end of March by a small North Korean submarine, Pyongyang is promising more defiant action. In a statement issued on Monday, the North Korean government referred to its "nuclear deterrent", a term that it had used before conducting nuclear tests in October 2006 and May 2009. This time around it went a step further to warn that it had a new approach to demonstrate its strategic capabilities. China, in turn, has condemned the US-South Korea military exercises planned for this

» Uyghurs Commemorate the One- year Anniversary of the Urumchi Tragedy... - 30-June-2010
Wednesday, 30 June 2010 On July 5th, Uyghurs in exile around the world and their supporters will remember and honor the lives lost a year ago during the Urumchi tragedy in East Turkestan and show their continued dedication to the Uyghurs' struggle for human rights and freedom. Below is a Statement issued by the World Uyghur Congress on June 29th: For immediate release June 29, 2010 Contact: World Uyghur Congress (www.uyghurcongress.org) 0049 (0) 89 5432 1999 (Munich, Germany), +1 (202) 535 0048 (Washington, DC, USA) Pigeons over flag : Pigeons fly over a flag of East Turkestan as Turks pray during funeral prayers for Uighur victims who were killed in China?s Xinjiang region, in Turkish capital Ankara. (AFP/Adem Altan) On July 5, 2010 and in the days surrounding July 5th, Uyghurs in exile and their supporters around the globe will stage demonstrations and other actions to commemorate the one-year anniversary of one of the saddest and most horrific days in the history of the Uyghur

» An open door for Mutalip - 30-June-2010
Christian Today SIM Australia Tuesday, 22 June 2010, 16:38 (EST) The name of the city where Mutalip was born remained the same for thousands of years. When Mutalip’s grandfather was a boy, he was one of about a million Uighur (WEE-gur) people living in this desert oasis. At that time the region had a very clear Uighur majority, and the official language was Uighur. Now the city has a new name. The official language is Chinese and all commerce and higher education must be done in Chinese. Even as little as six years ago, when Mutalip graduated from college, 80% of the teachers and 90% of the students there were Uighur. Today that same college has just 20% Uighur teachers and 3% Uighur students. Last year, as Mutalip was reading about the history of the Uighur people, he wondered where many of the modern-day rules about living in Uighur society originated. He studied various Muslim rules and regulations, but found that they did not completely explain some of the things he was seei

» Espionage Probe Casts Shadow on Ties with China - 30-June-2010
Spiegel 06/30/2010 By Sven Röbel and Holger Stark A Chapter from the Cold War Reopens Espionage Probe Casts Shadow on Ties with China A new espionage case is putting pressure on ties between Germany and China. German prosecutors are investigating senior Chinese officials who they believe spied on Falun Gong supporters in Germany. The developments have seriously strained relations and brought back practices last used during the Cold War. When German Chancellor Angela Merkel flies to Beijing in July, she will have plenty of the usual accolades for the Chinese. She will say that relations between the two countries are excellent and communication is amicable and intense. "I believe that one can say that relations are gaining a lot of momentum," the chancellor typically says on such occasions. What Merkel will probably not mention publicly is the other side of the German-Chinese relationship, which is also gathering momentum. It takes place in the world of espionage and intelligence a

» Shaoguan, One Year On - 29-June-2010
RFA 2010-06-29 A screen grab from a video allegedly shot by Chinese witnesses inside the toy factory in Guangdong's Shaoguan city, June 26, 2009. HONG KONG—A year after an attack on ethnic minority Uyghurs at the Xuri Toy Factory in southern China’s Shaoguan left at least two people dead, sparking further ethnic tensions across the country, no Uyghur workers remain on the payroll, workers said. A Han Chinese worker at the factory, who was there when the violence was sparked in late June last year by the rumor of a sexual assault on a Chinese woman by Uyghurs, said the anniversary had passed without comment or incident, and that production had continued as normal. “The actual situation on the ground was far worse than the rumors circulating on the Internet,” he said. But he declined to give details, nor to elaborate on the reasons for the clashes. He said he was convinced that the clashes were caused by a lack of mutual understanding. “It was a misundersta

» EU must press China over human rights: Amnesty, HRW - 28-June-2010
Expatica Communications 28/06/2010 Human rights groups Monday urged the European Union to use talks with China this week to demand Beijing release dissidents, withdraw curbs on freedom of expression and end arbitrary arrests. "The European Union must seize this opportunity to address the serious human rights violations reported throughout the country," said Esteban Beltran, the director of Amnesty International Spain. It should demand "strong action from the Chinese government to promote the reforms needed to once and for all respect human rights," he said in a statement. Spain, which holds the six-month rotating presidency of the EU, hosts the latest round of a human rights dialogue with China in Madrid on Tuesday. But the US-based organisation Human Rights Watch (HRW) charged that the dialogue, which began in 1995, has "consistently failed" to produce substantive results because it is not linked to other issues "such as trade, investment and the environment. "For too long, the EU-Ch

» China's push to develop its west hasn't closed income gap with east, critics say... - 28-June-2010
By Keith B. Richburg Washington Post Staff Writer Tuesday, June 29, 2010; A11 BEIJING - Ten years ago, China's leadership launched its "Go West" campaign, an ambitious plan to develop and modernize the country's poor western hinterlands. The aim was simple: to close the region's yawning income gap with the more prosperous east and assuage restive minority populations, particularly in Xinjiang and Tibet. Chinese officials rattle off all the statistical measures of the program's success: Highways were constructed. Houses were built. Nomads were resettled in "model" villages. Millions of people have electricity and clean drinking water. A rail line links Beijing in the east to Lhasa on the Tibetan plateau. And annual economic growth in the west is about 12 percent, higher than the national average. But beneath the barrage of official statistics lies another reality. China's west - defined as the dozen provinces and "autonomous regions" stretching from Inner Mongolia to Xinjiang and Tibet

» China's Major Terrorist Haul - 25-June-2010
The Diplomat By Jason Miks June 25, 2010 arlier this week, Chinese authorities said they had uncovered a ‘major’ terrorist organization. The timing raised some eyebrows, as it the announcement came just a couple of weeks before the anniversary of the riots last year in Ürümqi, in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, during which almost 200 people were killed after Uyghur protests turned violent and protesters turned on ethnic Han. The Chinese government said that the riots were pre-planned and instigated from abroad, with official fingers pointing to the exiled independence group the World Uyghur Congress (an allegation the WUC denied). The violence came on the back of long-running tensions between the Uyghur’s and majority Han migrants, with many Uyghur’s complaining that they are discriminated against in terms of employment prospects and when trying to secure bank loans. So what had this ‘major’ organisation been putting together before

» China Breaks Up Xinjiang Terror Group - 24-June-2010
VOA Beijing 24 June 2010 The Chinese government says it has broken up a major terrorist organization that plotted attacks in the far northwestern region, Xinjiang. Thursday's announcement comes nearly a year after the region was hit by deadly ethnic violence that left nearly 200 people dead. Chinese Public Security Ministry spokesman Wu Heping said Chinese public security authorities have arrested more than 10 terrorists, including the alleged ringleader of the group. Two Xinjiang incidents specifically mentioned by the spokesman both occurred around the 2008 Beijing Olympics - deadly attacks on police stations in Kashgar and Kuqa. At a meeting with reporters in Beijing, Thursday, Wu read out a brief statement, but did not take questions. A document handed out at the media briefing included photos of two places where the terrorists had allegedly made and tested explosives, along with other weapons. China said the alleged terrorists belong to the East Turkestan Independence Movement

» Ihsanoglu pays unprecedented visit to Chinese Muslim regions - 24-June-2010
Saudi Gazette By Habib Shaikh 2010-06-24 JEDDAH - The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu made an unprecedented first visit by an OIC secretary general to the Muslim-majority Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and the Muslim-majority autonomous region of Ningxia, and toured the historical city of Kashgar, during his eight-day official tour of China that concluded on Tuesday. The visit was especially significant because China is known for its categorical rejection of any foreign interference in the affairs of its ethnic minorities. According to informed OIC sources, Ihsanoglu toured the mosques and religious sites in Kashgar. In his meeting with the city’s municipality chief, Akbar Ghofur, the Secretary General reiterated the need to preserve the traditional nature of Kashgar and stressed that economic industrial expansion should not come at the expense of the cultural heritage of the city which is one of the most outstanding histor

» China breaks up Muslim terrorist gang - 24-June-2010
Telegraph UK Peter Foster in Beijing Published: 4:12PM BST 24 Jun 2010 The group with alleged links to the banned East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) was said to be plotting further attacks using pipe-bombs and other improvised explosives in the restive western Chinese province of Xinjiang. The announcement at a news conference in Beijing came days before the one-year anniversary of brutal race riots in the Xinjiang capital Urumqi that left 200 dead and exposed the deep divisions between majority Han Chinese and the minority ethnic Uighur populations. "Since 2008 this terror group planned and carried out many terror acts in Xinjiang, including an attack on police and border guards in Kashgar during the Olympics," said the Public Security Bureau spokesman. "The breaking up of this large terrorist group once again proves that the East Turkestan Islamic Movement is the major terror threat facing China at present and henceforward," he added. The riot on July 5 last year was the most se