In the center of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-western part of China, the province of Xinjiang is the very least populated province while it covers close to a sixth with the country's territory. Getting resisted during centuries the chinese control, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Old East Turkestan, fell within the Chinese Han control in 1949. From then, its population is generally Uyghur People and Turkic - speaking System.
Islamic primarily, the Uyghur people have a solid religious identity which, in particular, permitted them to protect a strong difference in opposition to the Chinese enemy. Really, the Uyghur Empire of Mongolia knew a great civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their own background, 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., therefore beginning the way to the Islamization of the entire Central Asia.
Under the influence of the religions which they taken on, Uyghur People taken successively, and at times in a competing way, a large number of written forms (turco-runic, brahmi, tokharien, soghdien) before developing their own unique graphic system.
The arrival of Islam was a great change simply because it was followed by the assimilation of the Uyghur areas in the immense Turkic and Islamic Empire. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan progressively replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used these days.
If their writing, their language and their religion mark a real big difference with the culture of Chinese Han, the Uyghurs also are different from their characteristic, so characteristic of Central Asia's people. A shiny 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 people - a little for this kind of immense region. Thus, Uyghur people are now part of the 56 racial minority groups having been well known in an official way by the People's Republic of China.
This particular statute allows these people a few privileges in a country 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 the People's Republic of China, however, seems quite illusory. The presence of all natural resources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its distance with nations recognised as very sensitive, clearly encouraged the government to speed up the sinicization of this area. Million of Han thus came to settle in this new Chinese eldorado, monopolizing the larger responsibility work opportunities.
In reaction 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 flexibility, but in particular the recognition of their true identity, this movement was seriously repressed by the power authorities in area Xinjiang.
The situations 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 keep up their identification and their tradition , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own territory.
For additional information and facts about Uyghur people, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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