Paul
Goble
Staunton, July 2 – China’s massive investments
in Xinjiang combined with its willingness to repress quickly any challenges to
its rule there is keeping that still 50 percent Muslim region from become “a
Chinese Chechnya,” according to a Russian analyst who has travelled there regularly
since 1991.
But that does not mean that the
indigenous population likes let alone accepts its Chinese overlords or that it
will not continue to revolt in the future, Igor Rotar argues in a thoughtful
analysis comparing the future of Xinjiang with the past of the Soviet Union and the current
situations in Central Asia and the North Caucasus (rosbalt.ru/main/2013/07/01/1147347.html).
The current outburst of violence between
Muslim groups and Han Chinese in Xinjiang has prompted some Western journalists
to call that Muslim region “a Chinese Chechnya,” Rotar notes, but the real
parallels are “not so much with the situation in the North Caucasus than with
the problems of the Central Asian republics of the former USSR.
Indeed, Rotar says, one’s “first
impression” in Xinjiang is “that you are in Central Asia,” a feeling that is
entirely appropriate given that “the Xinjiang-Uyghur Autonomous District of
China is an extension of Central Asia,” albeit one that has been “subjected to Chines (but not
Russian) colonization.”
In antiquity, he continues, Eastern
Turkestan as it is often called by its Muslim residets was “a most powerful
state which exerted an enormous influence not only on Central Asia but also on
China.” Chinese forces occupied it only
in 1759, and that recent date is reflected in its name, “Xin jiang” or “new
borderland.”
The indigenous Uyghur population has
revolted more than 400 times since then, most significantly in 1944 when the
Uyghurs, aided by the Soviet Union, were able to take under their control the
western portion of Xinjiang and “proclaim the Eastern Turkestan Republic. But in
1949, Stalin decided to back the Chinese communists and that republic was
suppressed.
Since that time, Rotar says, “Beijing
has in practice completely copied Soviet nationality policy, setting up Uyghur,
Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and Tajik national districts, putting members of the titular nationality
in charge of them and establishing newspapers and even television channels in
the national languages
But in contrast to Central Asia
where relations between the representatives of the imperial power, the
Russians, were relatively good, in Xinjiang, “the overwhelming majority of the Uyghurs
view the Chinese as occupiers” and hated occupiers at that. They do not
willingly associate with the Chinese or learn Chinese.
Moreover, the Uyghurs are much more
devout Muslims than the peoples of
Central Asia, but the Chinese authorities have “practically copied” the actions
of the Uzbekistan and Tajikistan governments in order to try to reduce the
influence of Islam, although it must be said, Rotar continues, that Beijing is
much harsher than Tashkent or Dushanbe in this regard.
“Chinese propaganda loves to stress that
the leadership of the country has taken into consideration ‘the sad experience’
of the USSR” and that Beijing has introduced economic “freedom” more quickly
than it has granted “political rights.”
And Beijing has in this regard invested far more in the non-Han regions
than Moscow did in Central Asia.
The success of that strategy, Rotar
argues, is “really striking” and has transformed Xinjiang from a backwater to
an economically prosperous place. As a
result, while in Soviet times, Central Asia was more advanced than Xinjiang,
now the reverse is true, and that has had political consequences with the
number of backers of independence having fallen dramatically.
In short, Beijing’s policy of carrots and
sticks has brought it relative stability. It has not won over the hearts and
minds of the indigenous people who continue to hate the Hans, but it has led many
of them to decide that the benefits of cooperation and the certainty of
punishment for separatist actions make going along most of the time the best
choice.
Consequently, according to the
Russian analyst, occasional local revolts, that will be “instantly put down by
the authorities” are likely but “a major and lengthy revolt” in the region is
not likely. Had Moscow behaved equally generously and harshly in Central Asia,
it would not have lost those five republics in 1991.
As for comparisons between Xinjiang
and the North Caucasus, Rotar says, there things are “somewhat more
complicated. The latter region has a
long tradition of resisting Russian power but “the majority of North Caucasians
understand” that their situation would likely become worse than it now is.
But because Moscow today cannot
afford to invest in the North Caucasus in the amounts that Beijing can and does
invest in Xinjiang, it is left with fewer levers to control the situation and
therefore almost certainly faces a more difficult road ahead than do the
Chinese in their “new borderland.”
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