In the center of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the northern-western part of China, the province of Xinjiang is the least populated province while it covers near to a sixth from the nation's territory. Getting resisted while in generations the chinese domination, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Old Eastern Turkestan, fell into under the Chinese Han control in 1949. From then, its population is primarily Uyghurs and Turkic - speaking System.
Muslim especially, the Uyghurs have a solid religious identification which usually, in specific, permitted them to keep a strong difference towards the Chinese enemy. Of course, the Uyghur Empire of Mongolia knew a excellent civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their own historical past, the Uyghur People successively taken on Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before lastly moving to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., thus beginning the way to the Islamization of the whole Central Asia.
Under the effect of the beliefs which they taken on, Uyghur People used 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 modification mainly because it was accompanied by the assimilation of the Uyghur land in the immense Turkic and Muslim Kingdom. Thus, the descendants of Genghis Khan slowly replaced their writing by a Arabo-Persan alphabet, still used today.
If their own writing, their own language and their religion mark a real big difference with the tradition of Chinese Han, Uyghur People also are different from their aspect, so aspect of Central Asia's people. A matt skin, eyes representing a whole pallet of colors, from black to deep blue, features directing 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 8 million people - a trifle for this particular great region. Therefore, Uyghur people are now part of the 56 racial minority groups having been known in an official way by the People's Republic of China.
This particular statute will allow these people a few rights in a land exactly where their big difference is very often repressed. Thus, Uyghur families escape the "single child policy" and their language is recognized 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, looks really illusory. The presence of all natural sources in Xinjiang, and its proximity with countries well-known as sensitive, strongly urged the government to increase the sinicization of this area. Million of Han thus came to settle in this new Chinese eldorado, monopolizing the greater responsibility job 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 freedom, but specially the recognition of their true identity, this movement was seriously repressed by the power authorities in place Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The events 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 identification and their ethnic heritage , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own territory.
For further information about the Uyghurs, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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