Turkic DNA,EAST TÜRKISTAN.

[northeast]

Uyghurs，were slaves of all kinds of mongols for 500 years before qing dynasty save them..they have been seriously tortured by dzhungar mongols.you turks should say thanks to han people and manchu people instead of hating us.

 

[UkroTurk]

Uyghurs，were slaves of all kinds of mongols for 500 years before qing dynasty save them..they have been seriously tortured by dzhungar mongols.you turks should say thanks to han people and manchu people instead of hating us.

At least they acknowledged about Manchurians.

 

[Quasar]

World Uyghur Congress

https://www.uyghurcongress.org/en/?p=37556

From denying the existence of the concentration camps to transferring thousands of Uighur prisoners to prisons in other provinces in China, Chinese authorities have been lying to the international community.

China has failed to hide the existence of the concentration camps despite its strong attempts thanks to Human Rights Watch reports, concerns expressed by the U.S. Congress, the U.N. Committee on the elimination of racial discrimination, academic researchers, testimonies provided by former detainees, and relatives of the victims. China has had to admit what became crystal clear to the world—the very existence of the concentration camps.

However, China has still been trying to obstinate itself against pressure from the international community. It has been doing so by telling at least three lies about the concentration camps.

Lie One
China has lied that the concentration camps are “vocational training centres” or “transformation through education” centers.

There is a clear difference between vocational education and concentration camps. Britannica defines vocational education as “instruction intended to equip persons for industrial or commercial occupations.” It also defines a concentration camp as an “internment center for political prisoners and members of national or minority groups who are confined for reasons of state security, exploitation, or punishment, usually by executive decree or military order. Persons are placed in such camps often on the basis of identification with a particular ethnic or political group, rather than as individuals, and without benefit either of indictment or fair trial.” It also emphasizes that concentration camps are different from prisons where people imprisoned due to criminal behaviour. The definition tells that the purpose of establishing a vocational school is significantly different from the purpose of creating a concentration camp, and the people they target is dissimilar.

The descriptions provided in the media coverage and testimonies provided by the former detainees indicate that the camps built in China to lock up Uighurs resemble the facts about the concentration camps. French Press Agency (AFP) examined more than 1,500 publicly available Chinese government documents and stated that the camps are run “more like jails than schools.”

AFP also revealed that Hotan prefecture in the Uighur region purchased 2,768 police batons, 550 electric cattle prods, 1,367 pairs of handcuffs, and 2,792 cans of pepper spray in early 2018. Such equipment is unlikely to serve the purpose of a vocational school and raises questions about what a remote place like Hotan would have to need such equipment.

In recent research, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute concluded that China’s “transformation through education centers are punitive in nature and more akin to prisons than camps.” The facts prove that the concentration camps have a lot in common with the concentration camps operated by the Nazis during WWII. Hence, calling the concentration camps as vocational training centres or transformation through education centers is a lie made in China.

Lie Two
China has lied that the aim of the concentration camps is to train people.

Shohrat Zakir, the governor of Xinjiang, claimed that the concentration camps are training people on Mandarin language, Chinese history and laws, and aim to bring people into “modern” and “civilized” life. However, an official Chinese government document stated that in order to build better Chinese citizens, the camps must first “break their lineage, break their roots, break their connections, and break their origins,” according to an examination of government reports obtained by AFP.

Moreover, former detainees said the camps are designed to eradicate the ethnic and religious identity of Uighurs and other Muslim minorities to be assimilated into the dominant majority Han population.

Omir Bekali, a former camp detainee who was released because of his Kazakh nationality described that the detainees are forced to eat pork and to drink alcohol, actions contrary to their religious beliefs. He also said that he was asked to renounce his religious belief, criticize himself and his ethnicity. Another former detainee, Mihrigul Tursun, told the U.S. Congress that the detainees were forced to sing songs praising the Chinese Communist Party, to repeat slogans in Chinese like “leniency for those who repent, and punishment for those who resist.”

As a result of the mass internment and crackdown, the majority of the businesses owned by Uighurs have been shut down. The workforce in the rural area in the south of the Uighur region has gone either to the concentration camps or has been taken as cheap labour to inland cities in China. The streets of big cities and suburbs in the Uighur region became almost empty due to mass arrests and disappearance. Hence, the Uighur region’s economy has backslid dramatically since 2016.

Lie Three
China has avoided revealing the real number of detainees.

The Chinese communist government tightly controls the media in the Uighur region and has never allowed an independent investigation in the region. China has not provided any information about how many detainees have been locked up in concentration camps. Therefore, the exact number of detainees is still unknown. However, the number of detainees mentioned in estimated so far is worrisome. Human rights experts have estimated that the Chinese authorities have imprisoned at least one million Uighurs, with some sources claiming that there is evidence of up to three million detainees. Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD), a Hong Kong-based advocacy group, founded that the number of detainees in the concentration camps may have already reached two to three million people by June 2018. This estimate was summed based on data collected through interviews and data provided by CHRD and its partner NGO Equal Rights Initiative in Kashghar Prefecture between July 2017 and June 2018.

 

[Quasar]

I am not and will not respond to some cheap propaganda or post of some internet troll however a fact should be stated on China’s so-called war on terrorism, world refused to recognize the WUC, East Turkistan Information Center, The World Uyghur Youth Congress, as terrorist. Quite apperantly this is due to the lack of real evidence these Uyghur organizations were actually involved in acts of terrorism eventhough there are endless attempts to discredit Uyghur political leaders, and dismantle democratic and nonviolent Uyghur organizations abroad, fabricating stories and calling them “terrorist.” what China or organizations such as SCO say have little credibility on this issue. However, through political pressures and economic inducements, China shamelessly persists in its claim and demands other countries to side with Beijing in order to win its war on Uyghur “terrorism,” eventhough nobody is buying such a fiction & propaganda in the world. The very same mentality and propaganda can be seen here in PDF sorry but you can not buy people's dignity and honor!

 

[dBSPL]

A title that shows us, some genius , who cannot understand the hybridization of a nation which they spread from Central Asia to India , inland Europe or even Africa. Our culture is still standing. Our language still lives in every corner of the world we live in. History books writes the empires we set up on 3 continents.

The tribal is the most important element of the social order in Turks. The family tree is an important concept. It's called Genealogy. The "Töre" and traditions are protected by this structure. A Turkified person cannot have these elements but can adopt traditions. In order to have it, they must accept by one of the Turkish tribes. Nevertheless, the Turks are keen on establishing a family bond through marriage, which makes it open to hybridization. You can see this feature not only in the Ottoman Empire but also in all Turkish states.

As well as those of other nationalities integrated into Turkish culture, much more than of it has been the Turkish tribes who lost their Turkishness. Tens of millions of Turks are Arabized or Slavicized, though a little of them have preserved their culture and language. Bulgarians, Hungarians from pre-Islamic period , or and even though the number of these days is very low, the northern Turks in the Baltic region , or Kuloğulları who live in Libya-Algeria line, or Egypt-Levant Kipchaks settled with Tolunogullari and Mamluks, or many many more examples...

We do not live in the same geography for 10 thousand years, do not live in the same climate and do not neighbor the same nations. For this reason, the science of origin is more important than the description method with dna.

***

Anyway , some of great photos from Turkic world:

Gagauz Turks from east europe (orthodox Christians still have not lost their Turkish language and culture. Theirs origin comes from Gök Oghuz)

Qashqai Turks ( Shia muslim westerns Oghuz tribe which are living near central Iran. Just like the Turks in the Taurus, they still live the nomadic traditions. )

Avar Turks

Crimean and eastern europe Tatar Turks

Turcomans

 

[bsruzm]

A nice first-hand recent account of Xinjiang social, economic and cultural development.

***

Reveries on the Silk Road

Sherif Sonbol visits locations on the ancient and more modern Silk Road in western China with childhood dreams in mind

Sherif Sonbol , Saturday 2 Mar 2019, Al Ahram

Dancers at the Urumqi international bazaar (All Photos by Sherif Sonbol)

Even as a child I often dreamed of travelling in a caravan by camelback on the legendary Silk Road, the greatest trade route in history which joined China to Europe across the Asian continent.

Part of my childhood dream came true in October and November 2018 when I travelled to northeast Pakistan and headed out by car on a road being built by China along the ancient Silk Road at a cost of $57 billion.

The route extends from the border of the Chinese Xinjiang province to the port of Gwadar on the Arabian Sea in eastern Pakistan and includes Road, bridges and tunnels that cross three mountain ranges, most famously the Himalayas.

Learning different skills at Kashgar vocation centre

After this journey, I was surprised to find an invitation from China’s cultural attaché in Egypt, Shi Yuewen, when I returned to Cairo to visit Xinjiang in the west of China, one of the key posts on the ancient and newer Silk Road.

I found a stunning blend there of the liberal Arab world of the 1950s and the technology-savvy West of the 21st century.

I found towns where Muslim minorities live alongside other ethnic groups in a way similar to how people in Egypt and other countries used to live in the 1970s until groups that seemed innocuous at first began labelling others as infidels. This began with these groups’ pointing to women not wearing the hijab (veil) as heretics.

In Kashgar in Xinjiang province where the Uighur minority lives, I met a 45-year-old woman who was busy making clothes with other women at a local vocational centre.

She told me she had bought a flat in the town, and after some time her neighbour told her that she was an infidel and not a Muslim.

The woman was shocked by this deplorable and unexpected accusation and asked him why he had said it. He told her it was because she was not wearing a burqa to cover her face and body, like the women in neighbouring Afghanistan.

The woman then put on a face veil, fearing to be sent to hell, and then the man told her that all their female neighbours were also infidels and that she must join her “believer” sisters in attacking any woman not wearing a burqa.

He thus planted a seed about infidels in her head, along with subtle hints about violence and death that coincided with deadly terrorist attacks across the region and video footage similar to that put out by the Islamic State (IS) group of Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian and other victims.

I watched these videos and looked at various confiscated weapons in an exhibition in Urumqi which I visited next and felt sick to my stomach at the gruesome footage.

Another woman I met in a folklore class at the vocational centre in Kashgar said that as matters had got worse the Chinese authorities had intervened and said that what was taking place was illegal because calling society “apostate” could lead to violence, death, backwardness and poverty for all.

The authorities had given those calling for such things the choice between a three-year jail sentence or joining a vocational centre, and the majority had chosen the vocational centre in order to listen to different points of view and discover a version of Islam not drenched in blood.

Slamati Kuli dancing in her mall

I asked the director of the centre how he monitored the attendees. He said the programme began at 6am with activities going on until 10pm and that he trusted those who attended and did not monitor them in their leisure time whether during the day or at night.

I next visited the Id Kah Mosque, the oldest in Kashgar and largest in China, where I was met by Imam Jume Mamati who took me on a tour of the building.

He pointed to a spot in the garden, saying that this was where terrorists had assassinated his father Jume Tahir, the mosque’s previous imam whom he had succeeded.

A rug woven with flowers opposite the qibla (prayer niche) caught my eye. He said it included 56 flowers symbolising the number of ethnicities in modern-day China who could not hope to survive alone without being part of a larger unit.

I asked how many of these groups were Muslim, and he replied that 12 of them were.

As we headed out of the mosque, I asked whether the Uighur minority was being persecuted and whether this was because the majority of it was Muslim.

Mamati pointed to the shops adjacent to the mosque and said, “you need only to look at the names of these shops written in Arabic script as well as Chinese.

We are taught this language alongside Mandarin in government schools, so how are we persecuted when the government encourages people to embrace their own identity?

“Did you know that we and other minorities in China are exempt from the one-child rule that was until recently the law of the land? This shows that the government has never wanted to annihilate us or reduce our numbers,” he said.

At the Urumpi international bazaar

Further Meetings

I met Gao Jianlong, an economics professor at the Xinjiang Academy of Social Sciences, who welcomed me warmly and said he had visited Al-Ahram in Cairo and met many colleagues and editors.

I asked him about the economic growth rate in Xinjiang, and he said it was higher than China’s overall growth rate. In 2017, GDP growth was 7.6 per cent in Xinjiang and 6.7 per cent in the rest of China, he said.

Xia Yongmin, director of the West Asia and Africa Broadcasting Department at China Radio International (CRI), told me that the Chinese government was putting a lot of effort into economic development in order to benefit all Chinese citizens, Xinjiang included, especially since it was an important segment of the ancient and newer Silk Road.

He said the central government in Beijing had undertaken several projects, including some dealing with economic, housing, cultural and traditional craft matters. “We are keen on maintaining the individual characters of the Chinese minorities,” he said.

Other regions had provided facilities to Xinjiang as a contribution to the region’s economic growth, he added.

I took a tour of the local industrial facilities, including a fully-automated textile factory with an annual output worth 300 million yuan.

I was impressed by the astounding progress I saw, though also dismayed at the automation which was rendering more people jobless.

I asked Xia about this, who smiled and said that although the factories were becoming fully automated, some 4,000 people worked at the textile factory in maintenance, administration, marketing, distribution, purchasing, and so on.

I looked up China’s unemployment rate on the Internet and found it was 4.09 per cent compared to four per cent in the US.

The next morning, I went to Kashgar’s old town where I was met by a dance troupe performing a traditional welcome dance.

I toured the old market where shops and homes had been renovated, including those surrounding the Id Kah Mosque at a cost of $1 billion.

The first shop I stopped at was an ironsmith’s making horseshoes, and then I stopped off at several others, including shops dealing in metalwork, woodwork, carpet weaving and hat making.

I savoured a glass of Chinese green tea with raisins and other dried fruit at the home of local businesswoman Slamati Kuli who owns shops selling a variety of goods from outlets nearby. I asked about her income, and she said she had 12 employees and earned some 200,000 yuan a year.

I then visited a housing complex built by the government for residents who had earlier lived in the mountains under harsh conditions.

In one of the new flats, we were met by an old man and his wife and children who offered us food and drink. I had begun to have some doubts by this point because everything I had seen had been almost too perfect.

Someone asked the woman about how she felt about living in her new house, and she responded by bursting into tears. Her husband put his arms around her, and her children smiled as she wept.

They said they had been destitute in the mountains in the past, but now they had walls to protect them and a home in which to receive guests.

The woman’s tears removed any doubts that had been in my mind. Before leaving Kashgar, I visited a modern hospital and pre-school on the edge of the city and a market selling expensive camel-hide coats.

I also found a tariff-free area (similar to Port Said in Egypt), and I jumped at the chance to buy some Belgian chocolate. I then travelled to the region’s capital Urumqi and visited a centre for Islamic studies built by the Chinese government.

There I met Imam Abdul-Rakib Tumniaz, president of the Xinjiang Islamic Institute and an MP in the National People’s Congress.

We visited classes at the institute teaching Quranic recitation, and I heard a remarkable recitation of verses from the Quran by students who studied there and were given a monthly stipend.

The institute plans to graduate 2,700 imams every six-month cycle.

Learning different skills at Kashgar vocation centre

Since the imam knew I was Egyptian, he said that he had been to Cairo to meet with clerics from Al-Azhar to discuss the institute’s curriculum.

I asked about efforts to combat terrorism, and he replied that the society and government worked together and had prevented any terrorist attacks over the past two years.

I then went to the local train station built to transport goods along the Silk Road to neighbouring countries. A train arrived, and I counted 40 carriages racing past me at a speed as fast as my packed itinerary.

I next visited the international bazaar completed in 2002 in Islamic style that included a mosque, traditional shops, a food court, and musicians of all sorts.

Misrat Kaila, a woman from the Uighur minority, said she believed that “as long as you have a mouth to talk, you must sing; and as long as you have legs to walk, you must dance.” I saw the stunning mosque, and then I was swallowed up by the crowd.

It is nearly impossible to find good bread in Beijing, but here I found a woman giving away pastries for free and a bakery making Pakistani bread and a group dancing for joy.

I went to an impossibly crowded restaurant serving traditional dishes. The main dish found everywhere in the region, even for room service, consists of walnuts, almonds, dates and raisins along with skewers of delicious grilled meat.

There was a dance troupe encouraging everyone to join it, without any harassment of the female dancers as we sadly sometimes see in other Eastern societies.

Receiving guests at the old town of Kashgar

Outside there was a band of male drummers playing the tanggu (traditional Chinese drums), and I was surprised to hear that some of the rhythms they were playing were similar to those from Upper Egypt.

Leaving the bazaar, I went to dinner and then to the Xinjiang National Theatre to watch a show that took my breath away. Even though I was the official photographer at the Cairo Opera House for 20 years and often attended performances from around the world, I had never seen anything quite like this show.

The dancers were brilliant, and the show was performed on the stage, the ceiling, and walls of the theatre using astounding technology.

Alas, this spectacular show eventually came to an end. I headed to bed to be ready to take a flight home after a compact 30-hour trip exploring the new Silk Road of western China.

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/151/326503/Egypt/Features/Reveries-on-the-Silk-Road.aspx

***

NOTE: Located in the US, World Uighur Congress (WUC) has been designated as a terrorist organization by China and by other organizations such as the SCO.

As such, spreading their propaganda equals to spreading terrorist propaganda, same as promoting the PKK by posting their visual and textual material, using this forum as a platform.

The Administrators and Mods of the forum, I believe, need to take the required precaution to not allow the spread of terrorist propaganda by a terrorist organization nestled in the US and targeting China's sovereignty.

@The Eagle @waz @Horus @Arsalan

Written by an Egyptian, a vice editor-in-chief in Egypt's Al-Ahram Weekly. Their editor's are officially appointed by Egyptian government. I can't take that as an independent source of information, sorry. Yet, you speak of propaganda here. That's so sneaky of you.

 

[Bismarck]

@TaiShang

What do you think about an UN mission to control the camps, which not exist by China.

 

[Sanchez]

What is the profile of Turkic DNA? Does the OP have a tiny sense of genetics and molecular anthropology? Or other Turks do?

 

[damm1t]

History of how Turks and Turkic languages emerged. Avars, Göktürks and Uighurs. A nice lecture from Professor Kenneth W. Harl from Yale.

 

[Quasar]

anyone with a functing brain once more undarstands and appreciates the establishment of Turkish language and history institutes by ATATÜRK and the importance given to them by him in the early year of the newly born Turkish republic eventhough they become a joke nowadays. these Turkic people are our roots they are our past, present and future.

 

[Nein]

Funny how the Seljuks and the Ottomans are rejected as Turks by some third class turkists on the internet.

Seljuks and the Ottomans both did Turkification.

Devshirme system is an extension of that very system done by the Seljuks. If we did a devshirme system on the arab refugees it will literally solve our refugee problem.

Turks are not a unified race anyway we are all different but at the end of the day we are Turk. If a Japanese person wants to be a Turk I would welcome him with open arms same with an Arab.

 

[OIO]

Brief History
East Turkistan, also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China, lies in the very heart of Asia. Situated along the fabled ancient Silk Road, it has been a prominent centertur of commerce for more than 2000 years. The land of East turkistan gave birth to many great civilizations and at various points of history it has been a cradle of scholarship, culture and power.

The current territorial size of East Turkistan is 1.82 million square kilometers. The neighbouring Chinese province annexed part of the territory as a result of the Chinese communist invasion of 1949.

East Turkistan borders with China and Mongolia to the east, Russia to the north, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India to the west, and Tibet to the south.

East Turkistan has a rich history and a diverse geography. It has grand deserts, magnificent mountains, and beautiful rivers, grasslands and forests.

The Manchu Invasion
The independent Uyghur Kingdom in East Turkistan—the Seyyid Kingdom, also known as Yarkent kingdom, was invaded by Manchu rulers of China in 1759 and the East Turkistan was annexed to the Manchu Empire. The Manchus ruled East Turkistan as a military colony from 1759 to 1862. During this period, the Uyghurs and other people in East Turkistan valiantly opposed the foreign rule in their land. They revolted 42 times against Manchu rule with the purpose of regaining their independence. The Manchu were finally expelled in 1864 and Uyghurs established Yetteshahar State. However, the independence was short lived, Manchus invaded the East Turkistan again in 1876. After eight years of bloody war, the Manchu empire formally annexed East Turkistan into its territories and renamed it “Xinjiang” (meaning “New Territory”) on November 18, 1884.

Chinese Rule in East turkistan
After Chinese Nationalists overthrew the Manchu Empire in 1911, East Turkistan fell under the rule of warlords of Chinese ethnicity who came to dominate provincial administration in the later years of Manchu Empire. The Chinese central government had little control over East Turkistan at this period. The Uyghurs, who wanted to free themselves from foreign domination, staged numerous uprisings against Chinese rule, and twice (once in 1933 and 1944) succeeded in setting up an independent East Turkistan Republic (ETR). However, these independent republics were overthrown by the military intervention and political intrigue of the Soviet Union.

In October of 1949, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops marched into East Turkistan, effectively ending the ETR. The Chinese communists organized Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the territory of East Turkistan.

The Chinese communist reign in East Turkistan can be considered the darkest chapters in the history of Uyghurs and East Turkistan. Under the current conditions, the very existence of Uyghur nation is under threat. The Chinese communist government has been carrying out a vicious campaign against Uyghurs and other indigenous people of East Turkistan in order to permanently annex the lands of East Turkistan.

Despite all the brutal and destructive campaigns by the Chinese government against the identity and existence, the Uyghurs and other indigenous people of East turkistan refuse to be subjugated by China and are carrying on resistance torch, handed down to them by their ancestors, against Chinese occupation.

People

East turkistan is the homeland of the Turkic speaking Uyghurs and other Central Asian peoples such as Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Uzbeks, Tatars and Tajiks.

According to latest Chinese census in 2010, the current population of East Turkistan is 21.81 million including 8.75 million ethnic Han Chinese (40,1%) illegal settled in East Turkistan after 1949 (the ethnic Han Chinese numbered 200,000 in 1949). The Uyghurs make up at least 11 million of the population, although the 2002 census listed the number as around 10.2 million and still constitute the majority of East Turkistan. However, the population shifts more and more in favor of the Han Chinese and make the Uyghurs strangers in their own land. However, Uyghur sources put the real population of Uyghurs around 20 million.

East Turkistan is located beyond the logical boundary of China, the Great Wall. Historically and culturally, East Turkistan is part of Central Asia, not of China. The people of East Turkistan are not Chinese; they are Turks of Central Asia.

Records show that the Uyghurs have a history of more than 4000 years in East Turkistan.

Throughout the history, independent states established by the ancestors of Uyghurs and other indigenous people thrived and prospered in the lands of East tTurkistan. Situated along a section of the legendary Silk Road, Uyghurs played an important role in cultural exchanges between the East and West and developed a unique culture and civilization of their own.

In the early history, the Uyghurs, like most of the other Turkic peoples of Central Asia, believed in Shamanism, Manichesim and Buddhism. Starting from 1St century A.D and until the arrival of Islam, East turkistan became one the great centers of Buddhist civilization.

Contacts between Uyghurs and Muslims started at the beginning of 9th century and conversion to Islam began. During the reign of Karahanidin kings, the Islamization of Uyghur society accelerated. Kashgar, the capital of Karahadin Kingdom, quickly became one of the major learning centers of Islam. Art, sciences, music and literature flourished as Islamic religious institutions nurtured the pursuit of an advanced culture. In this period, hundreds of world-renowned Uyghur scholars emerged. Thousands of valuable books were written. Among these works, the Uyghur scholar Yusup Has Hajip’s book, Kutadku Bilig (The knowledge for Happiness, 1069-1070) and Mahmud Kashgar’s Divan-I Lugat-it Turk (a dictionary of Turk language) are most influential.

Geography
East turkistan covers an area of 1.82 million square kilometers, which is twice as large as the Republic of Turkey or four times as large as the American state of California. More than 43 percent of East turkistan is covered by deserts and another 40 percent is covered by mountain ranges.

The main characteristic of this huge land is two basins bounded by three mountain ranges. The two basins are Tarim basin in the south, which is 530,000 square kilometer, and the Junggar basin in the north, which covers an area of 304.200 square kilometers. Tarim basin contains one of the largest deserts in the world—the Taklamakan desert. The Junggar basin contains the Kurbantunggut desert.

Tengritagh mountain (Heavenly mountain) crosses the central part of East Turkistan dividing the country into south and north. Within East Turkistan, the Tengritagh mountain is 1700 kilometers long and 250-300 kilometers wide. Altay mountain in north forms the border of East Turkistan, Mongolia, Russia and Kazakhstan. Its section within East Turkistan is 400 kilometers. The Kunlun mountain is the south is the border between East Turkistan and Tibet.

The most important rivers are the Tarim river (2137 km long), flowing almost the whole length of southern part of East turkistan and empties into desert; the Ili river, flows west into the Kazakhstan and eventually flows into Lake Balqash; the Irtish river flows northwest out of East turkistan into the Arctic Ocean; the Karashaar river, flows east from central Tengritagh into Lake Baghrash; the Konche river, starting from the Baghrash lake, originally flows into Lopnur Lake, but now disappears in the desert long before reaching the lake.

Language
Uyghur formerly known as Eastern Turki is a Turkic language spoken in East turkistan mainly, by the Uyghur ethnic group.

It is spoken around 20 million in East turkistan. Uyghur is also spoken by some 1.000,000 in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and there are Uyghur-speaking communities in Afghanistan, Albania, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Mongolia, Noway, Netherlands, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Turkey, United Kingdom, USA, and Egypt.

Like many other Turkic languages, Uyghur displays vowel harmony and agglutination, lacks noun classes or grammatical gender, and is a left-branching language with Subject Object Verb word order.

Classification
The Uyghur language belongs to the Uyghuric or Southeastern group of the Turkic language family, which is controversially a branch of the Altaic language family.

The languages most closely related to it include Uzbek, Ili Turki, and Aini. Some linguists consider the Turkic languages to be part of the larger Altaic language family, but others believe there is not enough evidence to support this.

Early linguistic scholarly studies of Uyghur include Julius Klaproth’s 1812 Dissertation on language and script of the Uighurs (Abhandlung über die Sprache und Schrift der Uiguren) which was disputed by Isaak Jakob Schmidt. In this period, Klaproth correctly asserted that Uyghur was a Turkic language, while Schmidt believed that Uyghur should be classified with Tangut languages.

History
Old Uyghur or Old Turkic is an ancient form of Turkic used from the 7th to the 13th centuries in Mongolia and the Uyghurstan/East turkistan region, in particular in the Orkhon inscriptions and Turpan texts. It is the direct ancestor of the Southeastern Turkic, or Uyghur-Chaghatai, family of languages, including the modern Uyghur and Uzbek languages. By contrast, Yugur, although in geographic proximity, is more closely related to the northeastern Turkic languages in Siberia.

During the 11th century, a scholar of the Turkic languages, Mahmud al-Kashgari (Memhud Qeshqeri) from Kashgar in modern-day Xinjiang, published the first Turkic language dictionary and description of the geographic distribution of many Turkic languages Compendium of the Turkic Dialects (Divān-ul Lughat-ul Turk).

Old Uyghur, through the influence of Perso-Arabic after the 13th century, developed into the Chagatai language, a literary language used all across central Asia until the early 20th century. After Chaghatai fell into extinction, the standard versions of Uyghur and Uzbek were developed from dialects in the Chaghatai-speaking region, showing abundant Chaghatai influence. Uyghur language today shows considerable Persian influence as a result from Chaghatai, including numerous Persian loanwords. Modern Uyghur uses the Urumchi dialect in Xinjiang as its standard, while the similar Ili dialect is used in the former Soviet Union. Russian sources cite the central dialect of Ghulja (Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture) as the pronunciation norm for modern Standard Uyghur. The similar pronunciation of Zhetysu and Fergana Uyghurs is considered standard for Uyghurs living in the CIS countries.

Uyghur Culture
Toward the end of the 19th century and into the first decades of the 20th, scientific and archaeological expeditions to the region of Eastern turkistan´s Silk Road discovered numerous cave temples, monastery ruins, wall paintings, as well as valuable miniatures, books and documents. Explorers from Europe, America and even Japan were amazed by the art treasures found there, and soon their reports caught the attention of an interested public around the world. These relics of the Uyghur culture constitute today major collections in the museums of Berlin, London, Paris, Tokyo, St. Petersburg and New Delhi. The manuscripts and documents discovered in Eastern turkistan reveal the very high degree of civilization attained by the Uyghurs. This Uyghur power, prestige and civilization, which dominated the Central Asia for over a thousand years, went into a steep decline after the [Manchu] invasion of their homeland.

Uyghur Music

Uyghur music embraces several distinct regional styles, product of the geography and complex history of the region, whose oasis kingdoms, separated by mountains and deserts, have been subject through the course of history to rule by many different outside forces. The musical traditions of the southern oasis towns of Khotan and Kashgar are more closely allied to the classical Central Asian traditions of Bukhara and Samarkand, while the music of the easternmost oasis town of Qumul has closer links to the music of Northwest China. Each of the region’s oasis towns have to this day maintained their own distinctive sound and repertoire, but they are linked by a common language and overarching culture, maintained by constant communication through trade and movement of peoples. Musically there is much to link these local traditions, in terms of instruments, genres, styles and contexts.

The most prestigious and well-known genre of Uyghur music is the muqam, the large-scale suites of sung, instrumental and dance music. In addition to the muqam the Uyghurs maintain popular traditions of sung epic tales (dastan) and other forms of narrative song (qoshaq, läpär, äytshish and mäddhi namä); suites of dance music (sänäm); instrumental music; musical genres linked to the ceremonies of the Sufis, and a huge repertoire of folksongs which commonly dwell on the suffering of life on earth and the torments of frustrated love. Contrary to the common perception of Islam in the West as hostile to music, amongst the Uyghurs many traditional musical contexts are linked to the religion, largely due to the influence of the Sufis who use music to express and promote their faith. Today these traditional genres compete with a lively pop music industry and the music of the professional, state-sponsored troupes.

[Excerpted from Dr. Rachel Harris & Yasin Muhpul — Originally Published 2002. Encyclopedia of the Turks, vol. 6. Istanbul: Yeni Turkiye, p. 542-9.]

Uyghur Literature
The Uyghur have a long and rich literary history befitting a people that once ruled a great empire in Central Asia. As soldiers and diplomats and as educators they have always been known as an educated people. The Uyghur have been printing their own books for many hundreds of years prior to the invention of the Guttenberg press. The earliest Uyghur literature revolved around the translation of religious texts both Buddhist and Manichean but also included narrative, epic and poetic works.

After converting to Islam the Uyghurs continued being cultural giants of Central Asia and Uyghur literature entered a golden era with it’s cultural centre being based in Kashgar. In the 11th century Yusuf Has Hajib wrote “Kutat-Ku Bilik” (Blessings and Wisdom) Other literature from that time include “Divan-i Lugat-it Turk” an encyclopedic dictionary and “Kitabu Cevahir-im nahr fi Lugat-it Turki” a work on grammar written by Mahmut Kasgari and “Atabetul Hakayik” by Ahmet Yukneki. All of these works came from Kashgar and confirmed Kashgar as being the centre of Uyghur culture and literature. The middle ages also witnessed the literature, poetry and music of the Chinese being significantly influenced by the Uighurs.

The ABC of Truth compiled by Ahmat Yuknaki in the 12th century is an outstanding poem in feeling and story.During the Mongol Yuan dynasty, the Uyghur nationality made great contributions to the unity of the country, the expansion of production and the flowering of culture and science. Notables of the period include military theorists Ark Hiya and BarqukArt Tikin; the statesmen; Bruhiya, Lion Xixian and Hisson, Guan Yunshi, also a noted poet and writer; Lianhuishan Hiya, a historian who compiled andrevised the History of Liao Dynasty; Lu Mingshan,agronomist and writer of The Fundamentals of Agriculture, Sericulture, Clothing and Food; Sinku Sail, a great translator who was a master of the Han, Weiwu, Mongolian, Tibetan and Sanskrit languages.

After theYuan dynasty, the Uyghurs also produced many famous writers, historians and scientists. Notable writings in Uyghur include the poem “Flower and Spring” by Lutfin in the 15th century; the long lyrical “Love and LaborPoem” by Kirkiti (1634-1672); lyrics by Zalili; (1685-1759); Collection of Love Poems by Abdureyim Hizari (1770- 1848) who was brought up in Kashi, of which Rabiya–Saydin parhad–Xirin and layli–Majnunhave long been on the lips of people; Biography of Hojas, written between 1768 and 1769 by Muhammad Sadik Kaxkari; the History of Hamedee from the 19th century by Molla Msa Sayrami; and the History of Kaxkariya. The 18th century saw a pentalingual dictionary written with the Chinese title “Wuti Qinwen jian” which has 18,000 entries and covers the Chinese, Mongolian, Tibetean, Manchu and Uyghur Languages. Maulabilalibin Maulayusuf wrote also in that century the Epic „War on Chinese Land” a work describing the struggle in 1864 with the Chinese.

The 17th and 18th centuries also saw the beginnings of western interest in Uyghur literature particularly from the Russians thus giving rise to the Western Turkologist Gunnar Jarring a Swedish Turkologist gathered many significant collections particularly from Kashgar and Hotan during his visit to Kashmir 1929-1930. These works are very important to the classification of the general Turkish language. Among the works Jarring documented were historical, ethnological texts, proverbs and poetry, riddles and fairy tales. Uyghur fairy tales follow similar veins as Western fairy tales with heroes, strong characters, the triumph of love and tales of justice and injustice, avarice, cruelty and foolishness.

20th century authors include Ziya Samedi, Abdurrahaman Gur, Teyupcan LLiyup and Zunan Kadir (1912-1989). Samedi wrote a number of historical novels such as “Secrets of Years”, “Mr. Ahmadjan Khasimi”,”Mayimhan”, and “Gheni, the Brave”. In the 1980s, Samedi was honored with the Kazakhstan People’s Writer Award, recognizing his unprecedented contribution tothe Uyghur literature. Kadir was an influential writer whose main themes revolved around the Uyghur and their experiences resisting cultural domination and attempted to promote the maintenance of Uyghur cultural integrity.

Uyghur Medicine

The Uyghurs had an extensive knowledge of medicine and medical practice. Chinese Song Dynasty (906–960) sources indicate that a Uyghur physician named Nanto traveled to China and brought with him many kinds of medicine unknown to the Chinese. There were 103 different herbs used in Uyghur medicine recorded in a medical compendium by Li Shizhen (1518–1593), a Chinese medical authority. Tatar scholar, professor Reşit Rahmeti Arat in Zur Heilkunde der Uighuren (Medical Practices of the Uyghurs) published in 1930 and 1932, in Berlin, discussed Uyghur medicine. Relying on a sketch of a man with an explanation of acupuncture, he and some Western scholars suspect that acupuncture was not a Chinese, but a Uyghur discovery.

Today, traditional Uyghur medicine can still be found at street stands. Similar to other traditional medicine, diagnosis is usually made through checking the pulse, symptoms, and disease history, and then the pharmacist pounds up different dried herbs, making personalized medicines according to the prescription. Modern Uyghur medical hospitals adopted the Western medical science and medicine and adopted Western pharmaceutical technology to discover new and produce traditional medicines.

National Flag and Emblem

The National Flag of East Turkistan

The National Emblem of East Turkistan
https://www.uyghurcongress.org/en/?page_id=29681

According "White paper" about Xinjiang by Chinese gov in 2019
1 Uyghur is not the original resident of Xinjiang
2 Islam is not the original religion of Uyghur
3 Islam is not part of Chinese traditional culture

If Turk want to make trouble, anytime!

新疆 = Xinjiang

新 means new
疆 means boundry/border

I know that there are many meanings for "Xin" and "Jiang" BUT after the Official name "Xinjiang 新疆" it literally means new border/boundry.

新疆 means 故土新归 , old land back home recently.
新 doesnot mean new, it means recently.

 

[Bismarck]

According "White paper" about Xinjiang by Chinese gov in 2019
1 Uyghur is not the original resident of Xinjiang
2 Islam is not the original religion of Uyghur
3 Islam is not part of Chinese traditional culture

If Turk want to make trouble, anytime!



新疆 means 故土新归 , old land back home recently.
新 doesnot mean new, it means recently.

Can you tell us, which is...

1. Original resident of Uyghur?
2. Original religion of Uyghur?
3. Traditional Chiniese culture?

 

[OIO]

Can you tell us, which is...

1. Original resident of Uyghur?
2. Original religion of Uyghur?
3. Traditional Chiniese culture?

Read some books, its easy to find the anwser.

 

[Buğra]

We shiver? Do you seriously think that China is scared that someone may take Xinjiang away from us? We are not happy but we don't shiver, we know our power, unlike some country can never know their place in this world.

Power balance may change in the future, you know. 50 years ago, Turks were calling their fellow Turkic brothers in Central Asia as 'Captive Turks'. Back then, the Soviet Union were seen as an indestructible nuclear superpower, so for Turks seeing their brothers as independent nations were like a dream but they never stopped dreaming. However, later they became independent and there are 5 more Turkic states now. Today, Turkish people are still calling Uighur Turks as 'Captive Turks' and try to help them as much as they can. They are trying to strengthen the bridges between our people and they are also trying to create awareness among other Turkic people about Uighur issue. Who knows maybe one day they will also be an independent country or they might continue to be a subject of China but in a more free environment. I believe that kind of scenario is also pretty acceptable for Turkish people. But, I am sure about one thing: It does not matter how powerful China is, Turkish people will never stop claiming Uighur's rights.