In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-western part of China, the province of Xinjiang is the least populated province whereas it covers close to a sixth from the country's area. Getting resisted while in hundreds of years the chinese domination, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Old East Turkestan, fell within the Chinese Han domination in 1949. From then, its population is generally Uyghur People and Turkish - speaking System.
Muslim especially, the Uyghurs have a very good religious identification that, in specific, allowed them to maintain a strong big 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.
During their background, the Uyghur People successively taken on Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before finally moving to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., therefore starting the way to the Islamization of the entire Central Asia.
Under the influence of the religions which they taken, Uyghur People used successively, and sometimes in a competing way, a great number of written forms (turco-runic, brahmi, tokharien, soghdien) before developing their own graphic system.
The entrance of Islam was a great modification simply because it was followed by the absorption of the Uyghur areas in the immense Turkic and Islamic Kingdom. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan slowly replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used these days.
If their writing, their own language and their religion mark a real big difference with the culture of Chinese Han, Uyghur People also are different from their aspect, so aspect of Central Asia's people. A shiny skin, eyes representing a whole pallet of colors, from black to deep blue, features going out to the Mongolian, Turkish or Uzbek origins of these men and these women.
For a few years, China has included the proper identity of these remote people, though they represent only 9 million population - a trifle for this kind of huge area. Thus, the Uyghurs are now part of the 56 racial minority groups having been well known in an official way by China.
This law allows these people a few rights in a land where their big difference is very often repressed. Thus, Uyghur people escape the "single child policy" and their language is known as the second official language in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The integration of the Uyghurs and their culture in the People's Republic of China, however, appears pretty illusory. The presence of natural resources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its closeness with nations recognized as very sensitive, highly 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 higher responsibility job opportunities.
In reaction 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.
Saying more freedom, but in particular the recognition of their true identity, this movement was seriously repressed by the power authorities in place 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 peoples population continues today to proudly hold their identity and their civilization , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own land.
For further information and facts about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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