Tibet and Xianjiang provinces in China have remained turbulent spots often plagued with ethnic violence. Last weekend 156 persons were killed and hundreds injured in Urumqi, the capital city of the Xianjiang province, in what is being described as” bloodiest clashes in the country since the Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989.”
The details remain murky, but the real figure is likely to be far higher — making this not only the most serious violence in China for the past 20 years but the second uprising against the Beijing authorities in an inland province in 18 months, reports The Times of London.
Xianjiang, like the Tibetan plateau, has strategic importance for Beijing. The province is China’s largest natural gas producing region and is rich in minerals.
“Like the violence that broke out in Tibet before the Olympics, the clashes in the capital of Xianjiang province began as a local protest, apparently over the handling of an incident in a factory in southern China last month when two Uighurs were killed in a fight with Han Chinese.
“As in Tibet, things quickly intensified as police responded with beatings and bullets, and furious Uighurs turned on Han targets. In both provinces, the violence was the cumulation of local resentment at the massive inflow of Han, the anger that Turkic Muslim Uighurs feel at the treatment of Islam and the slights that the Uighurs say that they receive at the hands of the Chinese.
“The clashes come at a sensitive time, as did those in Tibet. China is preparing massive celebrations to mark the 60th anniversary of the Communists’ victory in 1949.” More here…
The Independent reports: “The violence began in the regional capital Urumqi on Sunday night when tensions between Uighurs and Han Chinese boiled over. State television showed images of rioters throwing rocks at police, smashing buses and setting fire to shops and cars, as well as bystanders holding faces streaming with blood.
“Burnt-out buildings and vehicles continued to smoulder yesterday, broken glass littered the roads and bloodstains dotted the concrete.The details remain murky, but the real figure is likely to be far higher.
“Xianjiang’s Governor, Nur Bekri, went on state television to accuse Rebiya Kadeer – a Uighur businesswoman who was jailed for years in China before being released into exile in the United States – of stoking the violence. ‘She had phone conversations with people in China on 5 July in order to incite, and websites … were used to orchestrate the incitement and spread propaganda,’ he said.
“It was a charge swiftly denied. ‘It is a common practice of the Chinese government to accuse me for any unrest [in this region] and His Holiness the Dalai Lama for any unrest in Tibet,’ Ms Kadeer, who heads the World Uyghur Congress (WUC), said in a statement.
“There were several conflicting reports, not only of the death toll but whether the victims were Uighurs or Han Chinese. Xinhua said 156 people had been confirmed as killed, and the number was likely to rise. It quoted a senior security official as saying many of the bodies he had seen were Han. ‘It was like a war zone here, with many bodies of ethnic Han people lying on the road,’ said Huang Yabo, deputy director of the Urumqi Public Security Bureau.
“But in a telephone interview, Alim Seytoff, a spokesman for the WUC, put the death toll closer to 400. ‘Most of the dead are Uighurs, shot and killed by the Chinese security forces,’ he said, adding that protesters had been confronted by four kinds of police (regular, anti-riot, Special Police and the People’s Armed Police), who had used ‘lethal force’ to disperse them. ‘This is a very dark day in the history of the Uighur people’.
“Tensions between the two ethnic groups have risen as the government has encouraged Han migration to Xinjiang. The Uighurs – who now make up just half of the region’s 20 million people – complain that they are being culturally destroyed, citing Beijing’s plans to raze their ancient Silk Road city of Kashgar as a prime example.
“The other grievance is that they are being muscled out of jobs and other economic opportunities and this is particularly pertinent in the main city Urumqi where the Han are in the majority.” More here…
Swaraaj Chauhan describes his two-decade-long stint as a full-time journalist as eventful, purposeful, and full of joy and excitement. In 1993 he could foresee a different work culture appearing on the horizon, and decided to devote full time to teaching journalism (also, partly, with a desire to give back to the community from where he had enriched himself so much.)
Alongside, he worked for about a year in 1993 for the US State Department’s SPAN magazine, a nearly five-decade-old art and culture monthly magazine promoting US-India relations. It gave him an excellent opportunity to learn about things American, plus the pleasure of playing tennis in the lavish American embassy compound in the heart of New Delhi.
In !995 he joined WWF-India as a full-time media and environment education consultant and worked there for five years travelling a great deal, including to Husum in Germany as a part of the international team to formulate WWF’s Eco-tourism policy.
He taught journalism to honors students in a college affiliated to the University of Delhi, as also at the prestigious Indian Institute of Mass Communication where he lectured on “Development Journalism” to mid-career journalists/Information officers from the SAARC, African, East European and Latin American countries, for eight years.
In 2004 the BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) selected him as a Trainer/Mentor for India under a European Union project. In 2008/09 He completed another European Union-funded project for the BBC WST related to Disaster Management and media coverage in two eastern States in India — West Bengal and Orissa.
Last year, he spent a couple of months in Australia and enjoyed trekking, and also taught for a while at the University of South Australia.
Recently, he was appointed as a Member of the Board of Studies at Chitkara University in Chandigarh, a beautiful city in North India designed by the famous Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier. He also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students there.
He loves trekking, especially in the hills, and never misses an opportunity to play a game of tennis. The Western and Indian classical music are always within his reach for instant relaxation.
And last, but not least, is his firm belief in the power of the positive thought to heal oneself and others.