Topics Covered: Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests, Indian diaspora.
U.S. Uighur rights Bill
Context:
U.S. President Donald Trump has signed legislation calling for sanctions over the repression of China’s Uighur Muslims.
Details:
- The Bill calls for sanctions against those responsible for repression of Uighurs and other Muslim groups in China’s Xinjiang province, where the United Nations estimates that more than a million Muslims have been detained in camps.
- It singles out the region’s Communist Party secretary, Chen Quanguo, as responsible for “gross human rights violations” against them.
- The Bill also calls on U.S. firms operating in Xinjiang region to ensure their products do not include parts using forced labour.
Background:
The United Nations estimates that more than a million Muslims have been detained in camps in the Xinjiang region. The U.S. State Department has accused Chinese officials of subjecting Muslims to torture, abuse “and trying to basically erase their culture and their religion.”
Who are Uighurs?
Uighurs are a Muslim minority community concentrated in the country’s northwestern Xinjiang province.
They claim closer ethnic ties to Turkey and other central Asian countries than to China, by brute — and brutal — force.
Why is China targeting the Uighurs?
Xinjiang is technically an autonomous region within China — its largest region, rich in minerals, and sharing borders with eight countries, including India, Pakistan, Russia and Afghanistan.
- Over the past few decades, as economic prosperity has come to Xinjiang, it has brought with it in large numbers the majority Han Chinese,who have cornered the better jobs, and left the Uighurs feeling their livelihoods and identity were under threat.
- This led to sporadic violence, in 2009 culminating in a riot that killed 200 people, mostly Han Chinese, in the region’s capital Urumqi. And many other violent incidents have taken place since then.
- Beijing also says Uighur groups want to establish an independent state and, because of the Uighurs’ cultural ties to their neighbours, leaders fear that elements in places like Pakistan may back a separatist movement in Xinjiang.
- Therefore, the Chinese policy seems to have been one of treating the entire community as suspect, and launching a systematic project to chip away at every marker of a distinct Uighur identity.
InstaThink:
Prelims Link:
- Who are Uighurs?
- Where is Xinjiang?
- Who are Han Chinese?
Sources: the Hindu.
