In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-western part of China, the land of Xinjiang is a least populated province while it covers close to a sixth with the country's area. Getting resisted during centuries the Han Chinese control, Xinjiang, or Old East Turkestan, fell within the Chinese Han domination in 1949. From then, its population is generally Uyghurs and Turkish - speaking System.
Islamic especially, the Uyghurs have a solid religious identification which usually, in particular, enabled them to protect a strong big difference towards the Chinese invader. Indeed, the Uyghur Kingdom of Mongolia knew a great civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their own history, the Uyghur People successively adopted Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before lastly 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 effect of the religions which they taken on, Uyghur People taken successively, and at times in a competing way, a great 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 supported by the assimilation of the Uyghur areas in the immense Turkic and Muslim Empire. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used nowadays.
If their own writing, their language and their religion mark a real big difference with the tradition of Chinese Han, Uyghur People also are different from their characteristic, so characteristic 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 9 million population - a trifle for this kind of immense country. Thus, the Uyghurs are now part of the fifty six racial minority groups having been well known in an official way by the People's Republic of China.
This statute will allow them a few privileges in a country exactly 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 Uyghurs and their culture in the People's Republic of China, however, appears quite illusory. The presence of all-natural resources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its proximity with countries recognized as very sensitive, strongly urged the government to increase the sinicization of this area. Million of Han thus came to settle in this new Chinese eldorado, monopolizing the higher responsibility job opportunities.
In response to this true will to assimilate the Uyghur people into the Chinese culture, an independent party like East Turkistan Islamic Movement(ETIM) was born in the early 1990.
Asserting more freedom, but mainly the acceptance of their true identity, this movement was seriously 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 Uyghur population continues today to proudly continue to keep their identity and their tradition , although they become a minority on their own land.
To get more detailed information about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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