Languishing inthe Republic's wok... The Hinds ce) SO re en con en Re ON Se Pen ee Re ecg \dless talent and opaque politics. » 7th the coming of terrorizm to Xinjiang, in many ways India's most forgotten neighbour, « local minority is caught between violent tremism and a government that tends to emphasise security over social problems. Tee a ed eR ceca eee eee eco gion. The violence took place, according to reports, near Kashgar, an old Silk Road city elase to China’s western irder, that is, in some sense, the spiritual and cultural home of Xinjiang’s native Uighurs, an ethnic Turkic Muslim ip that is one of China’s 55 minorities. ive years ago, a local guide told me of the region's cultural and historical links to Ladakh (which, he told me, once lay ithin the frontiers of the kingdom of Kashgar many centuries ago). One still finds clues to this history in Ladakh, too} SA ee ene eee en eee ec ey n and Chinese troops. The site lies on an old road that was once a trading route to Kashgar, and, I was told luring my visit, was named after a 16th century aristocrat who spent some of his life in Kashgar. ajiang is in many senses India's most forgotten neighbour (I confess I was utterly ignorant about the region’s story when I first visited five years ago). Like Tibet, it has a rich history of close cultural and historical engagement ith India. Tibet, however, is firmly in India’s consciousness with the exiled spiritual leader the Brey brant Tibetan community now in residence in India for 54 years. I've found Xinjiang a captivating place, located at Senet ket Re ee kee ee eh ce Re ea oad ets of old Kashgar transports you to a different time. The experience can be overwhelming, as you struggle to locate the faces, sights and smells that seem to defy easy description. ly most recent — and third — visit to the region, two years ago, happened to coincide with the end of the holy , 80 I arrived in a city that was bustling. The muddy alleyways of the beautiful and distinctive old quarter, jere traditional mud-brick houses line cobbled streets, were buzzing, as hawkers wheeled their carts of dried fruit find bread. One could barely move through the crowded streets around the Id Kah mosque that sits at the heart of the ty and is one of Xinjiang’s most important places of worship. I visited the family of 76-year-old Tunsahan Umer, 10 was about to break bread along with three generations of her family — three generations that had lived through the tumult of the 1950s and 1960s, when thousands of Uighurs were persecuted for their faith by Mao Zedong's ommunist Party. The reforms of the 1980s brought relief, when thousands of mosques were reopened after the ral Revolution and ordinary Uighurs were allowed to practice their faiths again. shehinds comopiovblogstblog-herses-tr-lealarileS477826.000Languishing inthe Republic's wok... The Hinds ee ead ‘oday, Xinjiang is grappling with a whole new set of problems. During my visit two years ago, Kashgar was tense. ‘weeks earlier, 20 people had been killed in violence at a popular market, when two explosions were set off in TT Re ee ae no ete at aaa ollowing day, four mon armed with knives attacked a restaurant run by Han Chinese — the majority ethnic group in —and stabbed to death the owner and four others. 1¢ Chinese government has blamed the violence on terrorist groups linked to the East Turkestan Islamic Movement {(ETIM) — a soparatist group that has claimed responsibility for soveral attacks and states as its objective establishing independent Xinjiang. A recent State media report, citing local authorities, said there were 190 such incidents last fvear alone. After a spate of violent attacks — including an attempt by threo Uighurs to crash a joop into a crowd of, .¢ worry for many Uighurs is that caught betwoen violent extremists on the one hand, and, on the other, a Se a eee eee Reels gue eere nt ce eee Ree a Ecc inaddressod. The two mast apparent anxioties involve the local economy and the practice of religion. On the former issue, ham Tohti, a respected Uighur economist, told me that unemployment among Uighurs is sky-high. Xinjiang jas vast resources of oil and mineral wealth. The Chinese government points to double- skyscrapers and shopping malls of downtown Urumaj, the regional capital — as vindication of its policies. Mast of the region’s breakneck growth is led by powerful State-run Chinese companies. I-you are not Chinese — or, at least, fluent in Mandarin — itis dose to impossible to find a lucrative job with these eampanies. ‘obti says the government is more focussed on achieving high growth and tapping resources, rather than trying to yring about more inclusive development. The result, he says, is high unemployment and rising dissatisfaction among y young Uighurs. In Urumqi, wealth disparities between Han Chinese and Uighur neighbourhoods are clearly here are also anxieties about how the government administers religious policies. While there are no restrictions on joing to mosques or celebrating Ramadan for ordinary Uighurs, college students and government servants — even if are Uighur ~ are not allowed to practice religion, according to many people I spoke to. ‘There is also concern f strange new government campaigns in Kashgar and Hotan that are pressuring local women to not wear veils, couraging men from growing beards, and ensuring that places of worship display national flags. he campaigns appear to be a reaction to the spate of attacks, with officials warning of "the dangers of extremism’ et they are only likely to further alienate many Uighurs, rather than address problems, indicating an alarming lack of ivity: as the AFP recently reported from Kashgar, the old Silk Road town is now lit Sao E Teeny sovernment-run “Project Beauty” stalls, where veiled women are “made to watch a propaganda film about the joys of SOR RU TaD nen apes etter a oa Connor sg etre ere UBER eaeaee DORE PAU i eo CEE eR mundram from the other side of the wall. shehinds contopionttg rce5877826.00