In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the northern-western part of China, the land of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region is a least populated province whereas it covers near to a sixth of the country's territory. Getting resisted during centuries the chinese domination, Xinjiang, or Old Turkestan, fell into under the Chinese Han domination in 1949. From then, its population is generally Uyghur People and Turkish - speaking System.
Muslim especially, the Uyghurs have a very good religious identification which usually, in specific, permitted them to maintain a strong difference in opposition to the Chinese invader. Really, the Uyghur Kingdom of Mongolia knew a brilliant civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
During their own historical past, the Uyghur People successively adopted Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before lastly converting to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., therefore beginning the way to the Islamization of the whole Central Asia.
Under the effect of the beliefs which they adopted, the Uyghurs used successively, and sometimes in a competing way, a great number of written forms (turco-runic, brahmi, tokharien, soghdien) before developing their own unique graphic system.
The entrance of Islam was a great change because it was supported by the assimilation of the Uyghur areas in the enormous Turco-Mongolian and Muslim Empire. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used today.
If their own writing, their language and their religion mark a real difference with the culture of Chinese Han, the Uyghurs also differ from their aspect, 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 roots of these men and these women.
For a few years, China has included the proper identity of these remote people, though they represent only nine million population - a little for this specific immense country. Therefore, the Uyghurs are now part of the fifty six ethnic minority groups having been known in an official way by the People's Republic of China.
This law allows them 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 known as the second official language in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The integration of the Uyghur people and their culture in the People's Republic of China, however, seems very illusory. The presence of all natural sources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its distance with nations acknowledged as very 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 larger responsibility jobs.
In response to this true will to assimilate the Uyghurs 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 seriously repressed by the power authorities in location Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The situations 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 Uyghurs population continues today to proudly continue to keep their identity and their culture , even though they become a minority on their own territory.
For additional information about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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