Latest Updates: china uighurs RSS
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razib, murtad fitri
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razib, murtad fitri
The shape of empires past. elaboration on my post about the chinese empire from yesterday.
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razib, murtad fitri
clarifictaion on article about chinese empire that aziz linked to below. at various times chinese dynasties have ruled portions of xinjiang, but the most recent conquest was by the manchus. it is important to remember that for most of the history of the dynasty domains outside of china proper were administered separately and different, and the manchu emperors ruled not as chinese potentates but as manchu warlords. the manchu overlordship was for example the outcome of a struggle with the western oyrat mongols which they won, and they turned tibet into a protectorate where they served as the defenders of the lamaist institutions, a role that the oyrats had for several decades prior. by analogy, for about 100 years in the 18th century the king of the united kingdom was also the elector of hanover. but the two domains were administered separately, and there were even safeguards whereby hanover and the united kingdom operated independently in terms of foreign policy.
the critical fiction of the modern chinese state is the idea that the manchus administered the west as if they were just another province of the chinese nation-state. they did not. rather, xinjiang and tibet were domains within the personal empire of the manchu warlord. naturally the communists have an aversion to admitting that their state is heir to an empire, so they make up a false history whereby xinjiang and tibet were always parts of china. it is in fact the height of irony that modern chinese have resentments with the russians because of the conquest of the amur river valley in the 19th century; the amur river valley was never part of the chinese domain before the manchus brought it into the chinese state.
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razib, murtad fitri
in the comments to a post on uyghurs people bring up that the ethnic strike has hit various non-uyghur muslim groups as well as the han. this brings up the quebec-problem. whenever quebec wants to secede, or threatens too, the indigenous people of the north assert that they’ll also exercise self-determination and return to canada. would the tajiks of xinjiang’s far west and the kazakhs of xinjiang’s northwest really prefer living in east turkestan as opposed to china? of course both these nationalities have their own nation-states in former soviet central asia.
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johnpi
Another one of the influential PR firm Benador Associates’ ‘experts’ is Andrew (Andy) C McCarthy, a National Review blogger, who recently got called out as a racist jerk.
Andy McCarthy believes all Uighurs are terrorists because they are rioting in Xinjiang, China. His evidence for them is that the Guantanamo Uighurs are “terrorists… trained in al-Qaeda-affiliated camps.”
Even disregarding the absolute lie of that charge, think about its logic: because 17 U.S. prisoners were held on terrorism charges, then ALL OF THEIR ENTIRE RACE are terrorists when they riot against a racist authoritarian regime.
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razib, murtad fitri
also, obvious #1 reason that any small non-rich countries needs to keep its mouth shut re: the pogrom against the uighurs: $. #2 reason? $. #3 reason? $
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razib, murtad fitri
aziz’s post at CoB on the china situation is interesting. i do think it is important to be careful of not overemphasizing the religious aspect of the conflict. after all, fewer than 50% of the muslims in china are uighur, with nearly as many being chinese speaking hui (there are few others groups like kazakhs). aside from the obvious religious difference, there are issues of
1) ethnicity, the uighurs are turks.
2) region, the uighurs live in china’s ‘wild west’
3) colonialism. xinjiang means ‘new territories,’ and for most of its history was not a part of the chinese state (the manchus administered it as a personal domain for much of its history, not as part of china proper)
4) race. the uighurs often do look different.
5) class. like many ‘indigenous people’* the uighurs are less well off than han immigrants to xinjiang* the manchus exterminated oyrat mongols from the northern half of xinjiang, dzhungaria, in the 18th century in a series of genocidal wars. dzhungaria was resettled by kazakhs and uighurs, before being swamped in the 20th century by han immigrants.
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johnpi
Glenn Greenwald: What if the Uighurs were Christian rather than Muslim?
Thoughts on reports of rioting in Western China today:
Just imagine if the Uighurs were a Christian — rather than Muslim — minority, battling against the tyrannical Communist regime in Beijing, resisting various types of persecution, and demanding religious freedom. They would be lionized by America’s Right, as similar Christian minorities, oppressed by tyrannical regimes, automatically are. Episodes like these — where a declared Tyranny like China violently acts against citizens with whom we empathize — are ones about which, in general, the American political class loves to sermonize.
But the Uighurs are Muslim, not Christian, and hostility towards them thus easily outweighs the opportunity they present to undermine the Chinese Government.
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razib, murtad fitri
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johnpi
“Palau’s accommodation to accept the temporary resettlement of these detainees is a humanitarian gesture intended to help them be freed of any further unnecessary incarceration and to restart their lives in as normal a fashion as possible,” [President] Toribiong said.
Palau, made up of eight main islands plus more than 250 islets, is best known for diving and tourism and is located some 500 miles (800 kilometers) east of the Philippines in the Pacific Ocean.
