Uyghur Muslims Face New Religious Clampdown
Uyghur Muslims in oil-rich Karamay city in China's troubled Xinjiang region have been banned from holding private religious discussions and barred from traveling to mosques outside their residential areas during Islam's holy month of Ramadan, which began this week, according to residents Thursday.
The new restrictions are part of tightened measures across Xinjiang, home to the Turkic-speaking Muslim Uyghur people, following a spate of deadly violence, the residents said, citing orders read out to them by police and other security officials.
"We have been informed that the situation is like being under martial law," a Karamay Uyghur woman resident told RFA's Uyghur Service, quoting security officials.
The woman said that the officials told her and several others that security in Karamay had been bolstered since June 26, when Uyghurs attacked police and government offices in Turpan prefecture's Lukchun township in violence that left at least 46 dead.
The incident led to a string of violence in Xinjiang, leaving at least 64 dead in total, as the region marked the fourth anniversary of the July 5, 2009 violence between minority ethnic Muslim Uyghurs and majority Han Chinese in the regional capital Urumqi.
"A lot of security forces are in the city during this time presumably because they want to secure this oil-rich place," said the woman, who came in contact with the officials after she and a few others had submitted petitions on community problems to the authorities
Published order
The authorities in Karamay, which means "black oil" in the Uyghur language referring to the oil fields near the city, have published an order banning religious discussions and large gatherings during the Ramadan which began on Tuesday, the Karamay Daily reported.
"Due to Ramadan, places of worship will be forbidden from holding all sorts of religious teaching activity," it said. "If there are violations, the places will be sealed."
Under the new regulations, Uyghurs in the city are also not allowed to go to mosques outside their residential areas and have to conduct their mosque prayers within stipulated hours, residents said.
There will also be an "around-the-clock" monitoring of mosques to ensure their security, they said.
The heightened measures have been criticized by Uyghur and international rights groups pushing for religious freedom in China.
Call to end restrictions
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent government commission dedicated to defending the right to freedom of religion, called for an end to the restrictions on religious activity in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).
“Launched in the name of stability and security, Beijing’s campaigns of repression against Uyghur Muslims include the targeting of peaceful private gatherings for religious study and devotion,” said Katrina Lantos Swett, the commission's chairperson.
“These abuses predictably have led to neither stability nor security, but rather instability and insecurity," she said. "Through its campaign of repression, the Chinese government has egregiously abused internationally recognized human rights, including the right of freedom of religion or belief."
"We urge the government to lift these restrictions, especially with the start of Ramadan.”
The commission said religious freedom conditions in the Xinjiang have deteriorated significantly since the 2009 violence in Urumqi which left about 200 dead according to state media.
It said that the Chinese government has instituted sweeping security measures that include efforts to "weaken religious adherence and stop 'illegal religious gatherings' and 'illegal religious activities,'" adding that such restrictions on Uyghur Muslim religious activities have caused "deep resentment of Beijing’s oversight of the XUAR."
Determination
Rebiya Kadeer, a Uyghur exile leader, called on Uyghurs to use the Ramadan period to renew their determination to defend their religious freedom.
"The Uyghur people will not lose their religion no matter what obstacles come in their way," she told RFA.
Uyghur residents in Kashgar and Turpan prefectures who were interviewed expressed dismay at the increasing restrictions on religious practices, including preventing Muslims from fasting during Ramadan.
Uyghur government officials, teachers, and students are among those who are barred from fasting, they said. Ramadan is the holiest month in the Islamic calendar when Muslims fast from dawn to dusk.
"[The ruling Chinese Communist] Party cadres make sudden visits to our homes to check whether anyone barred from fasting is actually fasting," one woman resident said.
Some groups have charged that party officials go to Uyghur homes to provide them with food and drink during fasting hours.
In Xinjiang, Uyghurs say they have long suffered ethnic discrimination, oppressive religious controls, and continued poverty and joblessness, blaming the problems partly on the influx of Han Chinese into the region.
Chinese authorities blame outbreaks of violence in the region on Uyghur "terrorists," but rights groups and experts say Beijing exaggerates the terrorism threat to take the heat off domestic policies that cause unrest or to justify the authorities' use of force against the Uyghur minority.
Uighurs at Xinjiang mosque have to face China flag when praying
Activists say local officials' move aims to 'dilute the religious environment' in the restive region
Authorities have placed a Chinese flag at the head of a mosque in western China, forcing ethnic Uighurs to bow to it when they worship, Uighur activists said Wednesday.
The local government in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region’s Aksu area placed the flag over the mihrab -- the traditional prayer niche that points the direction to Mecca -- prominent Uighur rights advocate Ilham Tohti told Al Jazeera. He called it an effort to “dilute the religious environment” in the area, where minority Uighurs often complain of ethnic and religious repression.
Al Jazeera was not able to independently verify the report at time of publication, and Aksu officials did not respond to multiple calls for comment.
Reports from Uighurs in the area said the placement of the flag has upset residents amid a series of fresh religious restrictions, which analysts say Beijing hopes will integrate Uighurs into Chinese society and pacify the strategically important region. Xinjiang is perennially rocked by clashes between Muslim Uighurs and China’s majority ethnic Han Chinese.
“They placed the flag at a very sensitive place in the mosque,” Tohti said, explaining that he has seen Chinese flags prominently positioned in mosques in China before -- but never in such a sensitive spot.
Tohti noted that Muslims pray facing Mecca in Saudi Arabia, but Chinese law and authorities demand unwavering allegiance to Beijing.
“They are essentially saying the flag is higher than religion,” he said.
Authorities in Xinjiang have recently imposed new restrictions on religious behavior. These including posting signs across the region barring women from wearing headscarves in public venues.
Tohti said the religious restrictions -- in a Chinese region bordered by Kyrgzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan -- are part of Beijing’s attempts to secure its business inroads in Central Asia, which analysts say is set to become a leading source of China’s natural energy imports.
“China is opening up its foreign affairs to the West. They hope not to have any problems as they expand their influence, especially not in Xinjiang. They are worried about this danger,” Tohti said.
China’s efforts to promote calm in a region that is key to its economic endeavors appear to be two-pronged. New religious restrictions compound decades-old bans on minors entering mosques to receive religious instruction and attempt to curb traditional fasting during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The government has also engaged in a protracted crackdown on what Beijing calls violent Uighur separatists.
Radio Free Asia reported Tuesday that local officials said 12 more Uighurs had been killed in a raid in western Xinjiang last month, bringing the total reported dead in crackdowns that month to 34.
Beijing attributed the ethnic clashes that killed at least 21 in April and another 27 in July -- after similar riots that killed hundreds in 2008 and 2009 -- to what it calls "terrorist" and "separatist" groups. Uighurs say the assailants are upset with social repression and a lack of opportunities to partake in the Han Chinese-dominated local economy.
“In (his recent visit to) Central Asian states, President Xi [Jinping] was really pointing out a Uighur terrorist threat,” said Sean Roberts, a George Washington University professor specializing on Chinese and Central Asian affairs.
“In context of U.S. military pull-out of Afghanistan, China is concerned about ruffling feathers of Muslim populations to the West, as they have large plans of expansion of influence into Pakistan and Central Asian Muslim majority countries,” he said.
But Roberts said it appears that Beijing's current methods are less than effective.
“Putting myself in the position of Chinese bureaucrats, their strategy is not working, so they are pushing it harder and harder. And their strategy is only exacerbating the problem.”
Tohti offered his own suggestions for a new strategy.
“If China really believes Uighurs are part of the country, then meet your responsibility to them. Uighurs are impoverished and have no rights. China needs to improve their living standards,” Tohti said.
Xinjiang Muslims Irked by Government Restrictions
Chinese authorities are taking steps in the remote western region of Xinjiang to regulate participation in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Official statements on several local government and school websites last week banned communist party members, government employees, students and teachers from fasting or participating in religious activities during Ramadan, which in Xinjiang started on July 20.
Chinese authorities say the prohibition was put in place out of concern for people’s health. They also say they are simply encouraged residents “to eat properly for work and study purposes.”
Xinjiang is home to many different ethnic groups, including Muslim Uighurs who make up around 45 percent of the region’s population.
Ilham Tohti, a Uighur scholar at the Beijing-based Minzu University, sees the regulations as a sign of mounting religious intolerance.
“Except from the period of the cultural revolution there has not been a time when religious restrictions were as harsh as nowadays,” says Tohti.
Tense relations between the government and the local Muslim population peaked during riots in 2009, which killed about 200 people. Authorities interpret much of the discontent in Xinjiang as separatist sentiment, and justify their monitoring of religious activities as a way to avoid religious extremism and terrorism.
Dilshat Raxit, spokesman of the World Uighur Congress - an exiled Uighur advocate organization - told media groups in recent days that the Xinjiang government has established “security and stability work plans” during Ramadan. Raxit said that the plan mandated official monitoring of mosques, home searches for non-state produced religious material, and “ideological meetings” to be held in mosque with Chinese Communist Party officials.
China’s constitution guarantees freedom of religion, and since 1984 the government has granted minorities in designated autonomous areas like Xinjiang numerous rights, including various degrees of self governance, affirmative action policies and greater control over economic development in their regions. But implementation of the law has varied greatly across China.
Tohti says that in Xinjiang the law is often disobeyed, and that local authorities regard religious belief as “factors of disharmony.” Tohti believes that the central government’s long-term goal in Xinjiang is aimed at eroding minorities’ customs.
“In a culture of atheism, religion is backward,” Tohti says, referring to the Communist ideology that sees religion as a feudal concept. “[The government] thinks that Islam in Xinjiang is a sign of backwardness and does not match with the present times,” Tohti adds.
Permits to open Koran schools are also strictly managed by the local government, which fears Uighur Muslims might be exposed to extremists’ training within its borders.
Last week local media reported that 20 people, all with Uighur names, had been sentenced to up to 15 years of jail for inciting violence and separatism on the Internet.
The courts said the suspects had manufactured explosives.
“I think that the government has a pretty tight grip on what people are doing in the country,” says Raffaello Pantucci, a Shanghai-based associate fellow at the International Center for the Study for Radicalization at King’s College in London.
“What they don't have a grip on is people that are going outside the country to train,” Pantucci says.
China has blamed unrest in Xinjiang on Pakistan-trained Uighur Chinese. Last year, when a series of violent attacks killed 40 people in the cities of Kashgar and Hotan, the region’s governor said that extremists in Xinjiang had “a thousand and one links” to Pakistan.
Pantucci says China has since put more pressure on Pakistan to monitor their shared borders, and has brought up the subject of Pakistani trained terrorists with the United States during Sino-U.S. dialogue on counterterrorism, institutionalized since 2009.
But in its most recent report on terrorism worldwide, the U.S. State Department accused China of suppressing Uighurs under the pretext of fighting against terrorism.
Internally, China advocates development as the only response to Uighur discontent and possible future radicalism. But critics say massive investment and Han migration have fueled local resentment against Chinese rule.
“It is a very difficult dilemma,” Pantucci says. “The solution that they see is, for some people, the problem.”
Minzu University professor Tohti worries that the government’s steps will incite more Uighurs to become radicalized.
“If the authorities are not tolerant, and if they do not provide a channel for people to express their dissatisfaction, then it is more likely that Xinjiang people will resort to violence,” he says.
