In the middle of the desert landscapes of Taklamakan, in the north-west part of China, the land of Xinjiang is the least populated land whereas it covers close to a sixth of the nation's area. Having resisted while in centuries the Han Chinese control, Xinjiang, or Old Eastern Turkestan, fell within the Chinese Han domination in 1949. From then, its population is primarily Uyghurs and Turkic - speaking System.
Islamic above all, the Uyghur people have a very good religious identification which, in particular, permitted them to preserve a solid big difference in opposition to the Chinese invader. In fact, the Uyghur Kingdom of Mongolia knew a great civilization, until its absorption by the Mongolian Empire in the XIIIth century.
While in their own historical past, the Uyghurs successively taken on Shamanism, Manicheism, Buddhism and the Nestorianism before finally changing to Islam when the Arab conquerors beat the Chinese in year 751 BC., therefore opening the way to the Islamization of the entire Central Asia.
Under the influence of the beliefs which they taken on, the Uyghurs 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 arrival of Islam was a great modification since it was accompanied by the absorption of the Uyghur land in the enormous Turco-Mongolian 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 difference with the culture 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 pointing out to the Mongolian, Turkish or Uzbek roots of these men and these women.
For a few years, China has integrated the proper identity of these remote people, although they represent only 8 million population - a trifle for this kind of big region. Thus, the Uyghurs are now part of the 56 racial minority groups having been recognized in an official way by China.
This law allows these people a few privileges in a land exactly where their difference is very often repressed. Therefore, 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 Uyghur people and their culture in the People's Republic of China, however, seems very illusory. The presence of all natural sources in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and its distance with nations known as very 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 jobs.
In response 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 mainly the recognition of their true identity, this movement was severely repressed by the power authorities in area Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
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 their identity and their culture , despite the fact that they become a minority on their own territory.
To get more information and facts about Uyghur people, you can visit a Uyghur website called Uyghur News at http://www.uyghurnews.com
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