In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-western part of China, the province of Xinjiang is a least populated province whereas it covers close to a sixth of the nation's area. Having resisted while in generations the Han Chinese domination, Xinjiang, or Old Turkestan, fell into under the Chinese Han domination in 1949. From then, its population is primarily Uyghurs and Turkic - speaking System.
Islamic mainly, the Uyghurs have a solid religious identity that, in specific, allowed them to keep a solid big difference towards the Chinese enemy. In fact, the Uyghur Empire of Mongolia knew a excellent civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their own historical past, the Uyghur People successively adopted Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before finally changing to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., thus beginning the way to the Islamization of the entire Central Asia.
Under the influence of the beliefs which they adopted, Uyghur People 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 coming of Islam was a great modification mainly because it was accompanied by the absorption of the Uyghur land in the immense Turco-Mongolian and Muslim Empire. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used presently.
If their writing, their own language and their religion mark a real big difference with the culture of Chinese Han, the Uyghurs also are different 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, although they represent only eight million inhabitants - a trifle for this kind of large region. So, Uyghur people are now part of the 56 ethnic minority groups having been well known in an official way by the People's Republic of China.
This particular law will allow these people a few rights in a country where their difference is very often repressed. Thus, Uyghur people escape the "single child policy" and their language is accepted as the second official language in Xinjiang.
The integration of the Uyghurs and their culture in China, however, looks quite illusory. The presence of all-natural sources in Xinjiang, and its closeness with countries recognized as very sensitive, highly 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 primarily the recognition of their true identity, this movement was severely repressed by the power authorities in location Xinjiang.
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 Uyghurs population continues today to proudly continue to keep their identification and their tradition , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own land.
For further information and facts about Uyghur people, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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