In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-west part of China, the land of Xinjiang is the very least populated land whereas it covers near to a sixth from the country's area. Having resisted during hundreds of years the Han Chinese domination, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Old Turkestan, fell into under the Chinese Han control in 1949. From then, its population is mostly Uyghurs and Turkish - speaking System.
Islamic primarily, the Uyghur people have a very good religious identification which usually, in particular, enabled them to maintain a solid difference in opposition to the Chinese invader. Indeed, the Uyghur Kingdom of Mongolia knew a great civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
During their history, the Uyghur People successively taken on Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before finally converting to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., therefore opening the way to the Islamization of the entire Central Asia.
Under the influence of the religions which they adopted, the Uyghurs taken successively, and sometimes in a competing way, a large number of written forms (turco-runic, brahmi, tokharien, soghdien) before developing their own unique graphic system.
The entrance of Islam was a great change since it was supported by the assimilation of the Uyghur land in the immense Turco-Mongolian and Muslim Kingdom. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used these days.
If their writing, their language and their religion mark a real difference with the culture of Chinese Han, Uyghur People also are different from their characteristic, so aspect of Central Asia's people. A shiny skin, eyes representing a whole pallet of colors, from black to deep blue, features going out to the Mongolian, Turkish or Uzbek origins of these men and these women.
For a few years, China has included the proper identity of these remote people, although they represent only eight million population - a little for this particular great region. So, Uyghur people are now part of the fifty six racial minority groups having been recognized in an official way by China.
This statute will allow these people a few rights in a land exactly where their big difference is very often repressed. Therefore, Uyghur families escape the "single child policy" and their language is recognized as the second official language in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The integration of the Uyghurs and their culture in China, however, seems really illusory. The presence of all-natural resources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its closeness with countries recognized as sensitive, clearly motivated the government to speed up the sinicization of this area. Million of Han thus came to settle in this new Chinese eldorado, monopolizing the higher responsibility work opportunities.
In reaction to this true will to assimilate the Uyghur people into the Chinese culture, an independent party like East Turkistan Islamic Movement(ETIM) was born in the early 1990.
Saying more flexibility, but in particular the recognition of their true identity, this movement was severely repressed by the power authorities in place Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The events of September 11, 2001, were the perfect occasion for the Chinese government to justify true reprisals: they declared the "Uyghur freedom fighters" as dangerous terrorists linked to Al Quaida because of their Muslim origins and their proximity with Pakistan and Afghanistan... However, the terrible repression which followed did not calm down the anger. The Uyghur peoples population continues today to proudly keep up their identity and their tradition , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own territory.
To get more information about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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