In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the northern-western part of China, the province of Xinjiang is a least populated land whereas it covers near to a sixth with the country's area. Getting 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 mainly Uyghurs and Turkic - speaking System.
Islamic especially, the Uyghurs have a deep religious identification which, in specific, enabled them to preserve a strong big difference in opposition to the Chinese invader. In fact, the Uyghur Kingdom of Mongolia knew a amazing civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their background, the Uyghur People successively adopted Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before finally converting to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., thus opening the way to the Islamization of the complete Central Asia.
Under the effect of the religions which they taken, Uyghur People used successively, and at times in a competing way, a large number of written forms (turco-runic, brahmi, tokharien, soghdien) before developing their own graphic system.
The coming of Islam was a great modification mainly because it was supported by the assimilation of the Uyghur areas in the enormous Turco-Mongolian and Muslim Kingdom. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used at present.
If their writing, their language and their religion mark a real big difference with the tradition of Chinese Han, the Uyghurs also are different from their characteristic, so aspect of Central Asia's people. A matt skin, eyes representing a whole pallet of colors, from black to deep blue, features pointing out to the Mongolian, Turkish or Uzbek origins of these men and these women.
For a few years, China has integrated the proper identity of these remote people, though they represent only nine million people - a little for this particular immense country. Thus, Uyghur people are now part of the fifty six ethnic minority groups having been known in an official way by China.
This law allows these people a few privileges in a land where their difference is very often repressed. Thus, Uyghur people escape the "single child policy" and their language is recognized as the second official language in Xinjiang.
The integration of the Uyghur people and their culture in China, however, seems quite illusory. The presence of all-natural sources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its area with countries known as sensitive, strongly motivated the government to increase the sinicization of this area. Million of Han thus came to settle in this new Chinese eldorado, monopolizing the greater responsibility job opportunities.
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.
Asserting more freedom, but specially 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 Uyghurs population continues today to proudly keep up their identity and their tradition , though they become a minority on their own land.
For much more information and facts about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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