One of the reasons why China is panicking over the Tibetan independence ‘genie’ popping up again is that it has over the years kept many such genies captured in bottles. The Uighurs Muslims in Xingjiang province is another restive group in the country. They are quite numerous; they number 8 million among a population of 19 million in the province. The Tibetan unrest seems to be fanning their sense of resentment against the Chinese rule. Many have come out on the roads to protest.
The Uighurs is a discontented lot. They feel (and rightly so) that their religious rights are being trampled upon. The violent elements in the community have joined Al Qaeda and Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This has alarmed China.
In an interesting aside, many Uighur Muslim fighters who were captured by US forces in Afghanistan and sent to Guantanamo Bay, have finally landed up in Albania. The US did not want to send them back to China as they would be tortured.
The Uighurs want to break free from China. This separatist tendency coupled with their Islamist zeal and their association with Al Qaeda is giving top Chinese leaders sleepless nights. What they want last is a clash between Islam and their communist-capitalist ideology.
In Pakistan resentment against China is increasing by the day. The impetus for the hatred is the bad treatment Uighur Muslims are receiving in Xingjiang province of China. Chinese nationals are being targeted. The kidnapping of Chinese girls from a massage parlour a few months ago was one of the stimulus that made Musharraf act against the Red Mosque.
Via: Timesonline
