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As I write, China’s army and police have quelled three days of deadly violence in its largest province. I wish I could say I knew the Uighurs would rebel against their Chinese masters but I didn’t. Fact is, I didn’t know enough about that part of the world and lacked the tools to compensate.
Oh, it was clear when I visited China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Province three summers ago that the Uighurs weren’t Chinese — not ethnically, religiously or culturally.
That’s why the Han Chinese tourists I bumped into there (the Han are China’s dominant ethnic group) looked at the Uighurs with amazement.
I guessed they were thinking, “Wow! They sure don’t look Chinese.”
No, they don’t. Uighurs are Turkic, an ethnic group the experts believe drifted down from northeastern Mongolia eons ago. Some boast high cheekbones, true, but others look like Indians (from India) and some like Minnesotans with odd haircuts.
“The Loulan beauty” complicates matters further. Excavated from the nearby desert after about 3,800 years, she lies in a glass case at the Xinjiang Museum in Urumqi, site of the latest uprising. And she looks Caucasian.
We’re on the Silk Road, of course, so it’s possible the Beauty (and other dried corpses) were travelers. Possible.
Uighurs dominated Xinjiang until Beijing subsidized westward migration. Think, “Manifest Destiny,” Chinese-style. Now the Han control Urumqi, the capitol.
I didn’t know that back then; my Uighur guides kept us on their side of town, including the colorful Grand Bazaar, scene of the recent rioting.
I found the Uighurs warm and friendly. I was at ease with them. They, in turn, were comfortable enough with me to resent the Han out loud. These were professionals, of course, who commanded English as well as Chinese and Uighur.
But lacking their language and history, I couldn’t ask “Why?” or gauge the depth of their feelings.
What I didn’t know could fill volumes. Government spies monitored the mosques (I gathered) but I had no clue that Beijing actively discouraged the Sunni Moslem Uighurs from religious practice.
I knew Beijing was raining money on Xinjiang to quiet Uighur nationalism, not that it was flooding the province with Han Chinese to dilute Uighur power. Yes, Tibet was the model.
It wasn’t until I followed the Silk Road from China’s Wild West across the borders of Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan — and was struck by identical language — that the “aha!” moment came.
There’s a place called Central Asia. It’s not a geographical term, but refers to the intersection of language, religion and history linking Uighurs, Kyrgyz and Uzbeks as well as some Afghanis, Indians, Pakistanis and Persians. It’s where they have ruled their own states, fought each other and co-existed within empires until recently.
Which makes a few things clear:
First, reporting the events in Xinjiang as “ethnic strife” is simplistic. They’re nationalist, too, which is why China, which last crushed a Uighur independence movement in 1949, acted quickly.
Also, Beijing’s fear that Uighur “terrorists” might disrupt last year’s Olympics was plausible.
And the Uighur “terrorists” we imprisoned at Guantanamo almost certainly aren’t al Qaeda, just Xinjiang nationalists who hate Chinese rule.
I’m unashamed of failing to predict the Xinjiang happenings; heck, I’ve missed stories in Old Town. But it’s a reminder that truth is elusive.
And reportorial ignorance is one reason why.
