ISLAM IN CHINA

Nadeem Ilyas

China's first contact with Islam was during the Khilafah of Uthman (RA) in the year 650 CE and
Muslims have lived in China for nearly 1400 years. Sa'ad ibn A bi Waqqaas headed the first
Muslim delegation sent to China by the Khaleefah Uthman (RA) to invite the Chinese Emperor
Yung-Wei to Islam. The new way of life brought by the Muslims spread throughout the region.
However, the destiny of the whole region was firmly established after the defeat of the China's
army (the end of the T'ang Dynasty) in a battle at the Talas River by the Khilafah state (Khaleefah
Abu'l Abbas).

Historically there have been many unsuccessful attempts by China to conquer the people of East
Turkistan since at least the second century B.C. It was not until the mid-18th century that the
Manchu Dynasty which invaded the Muslim region and renamed it "Xinjiang", meaning "New
Frontier". In 1911 East Turkistan fell under the rule of the Chinese Nationalists, and after a short
independent rule, fell under the rule of the Communists in 1949. Since then the Muslims of the
region have had to undergo unimaginable suffering and have been subjugated to inhuman
conditions under the repressive alien rule.

Cultural Dilution
In 1949, the indigenous Muslim peoples constituted 96% of East Turkistan's population, while the
Chinese who mainly comprised of armies and administrators constituted around 4%. After years
of government sponsored mass immigration, the Muslim population today has fallen to 60%,
while the Chinese population has climbed up to 38%. According to the official Chinese census the
Muslim population is slightly over 11 million, though in reality it is probably two to three times
more then this. In

Xinjiang, because Islam is essentially indistinguishable from local culture and identity,

Beijing perceives a particular threat to its rule. Therefore China is determined to destroy Islam in
the region in order to realize its plan to assimilate the Muslims. As a result, religious schools are
strictly banned, many mosques have been closed and the building of new mosques restricted.
Government employees risk their jobs if they go to mosques, and women working for the
government are forbidden to wear the Khimar and Jilbab (Islamic covering).

Beijing is also mounting a political re-education campaign for 8,000 Imams in charge of the
region's state-sanctioned mosques. This campaign started in mid-March 2001 and was to run
until the end of December. The Muslim leaders are required to attend seminars on religious and
political policies set by the government and on Xinjiang history as written by the Communist
Party. "These lessons are essential to the long-term stability of Xinjiang," said a recent report by
the official New China News Agency, "as they will guide our students away from ideological
confusion and mistakes".

The Muslims of Xinjiang are discriminated against in access to jobs, education, health care and
other services, polices which favor the minority Hans Chinese population. The Communists for
example, banned the traditional Arabic script that had been used in the region for more than a
thousand years and destroyed thousands of historic books.

China's assimilation policies have disregarded the traditional Islamic values. For example,
financial rewards are given to Chinese who intermarry with Muslims but any offspring are
registered as solely Chinese. In what is perhaps the ultimate attempt at ethnic dilution, China's
strict one-child policy has been waived for Chinese willing to move to Xinjiang; they are allowed to
have two children, a fringe benefit which encourages further immigration. In effect, there has
been a systematic policy to dilute Muslim culture and heritage.

Persecution of Daw'a Carriers

In a recent report released by Amnesty International, it was reported that China has
systematically executed, tortured and detained Muslims as part of an effort to stamp out Islamic
separatism in the region. The report said that the method of torture had included injecting
prisoners with mind-altering drugs, rubbing chilli powder in their mouths or their genitals, and
inserting horsehairs or wires into male genitals. The report went on, "against a backdrop of
economic marginalisation, social disadvantage and curbs on political and religious freedoms,
Uighur people are also the victims of state violence, from torture to arbitrary and summary
execution".

The following testimony was presented on 17 July 1999 by a Muslim prisoner who was able to
escape such torture; it provides a glimpse of the hatred they face by the Chinese prison guards.
"We will castrate the inferior masculinity of your turban-heads (referring to Muslims) and prostitute
your girls. What can you turban-heads do to us great Chinese nation? With our spit, you will all
drown."

What is in it for China?

Beijing's crackdown on Muslim unrest in Xinjiang is mainly a response to a perceived threat to the
stability of a region deemed to be of vital strategic significance. The two main interests which are
at stake for China are long-term political stability and moreover, economic factors of equal
significance. The ethnic problems the central government faces in China's peripheral regions are
widespread, serious and growing. The call for separatism in the Xinjiang province is providing
encouragement to the active independence movements in Tibet and Inner Mongolia. China is in a
very difficult situation because its continuous savage suppression of the peoples of this region is
unifying many against the brutal occupation. The current Muslim struggle in Xinjiang has clearly
been inspired by the enormous changes that have reshaped Central Asia in the last decade;
particularly in witnessing the call for the return of the Islamic way of life and the establishment of
the Khilafah state.

The securing of important resources is a major consideration in Beijing's policy towards the
region. Xinjiang is a vast area, which contains valuable resources including lead, zinc and gold. It
is also believed to hold huge oil deposits, which, if proven, will be of enormous benefit to China's
economic development prospects. Xinjiang is also strategically important because of its close
proximity to proven oil reserves in the neighboring Central Asian republics. For example, any
future transportation of Kazakhstan's resources could include construction of a possible pipeline
to carry oil to the major markets in China and Japan. As Xinjiang is located on the outskirts of
China's western region, Beijing is able to monitor the economic and political development of the
Central Asian republics. It is also able to closely monitor the ever-increasing aspirations of the
Muslims of the region to establish a unified and strong Khilafah state. The im portance of the
region to Beijing in terms of its economic and strategic potential perhaps explains the harshness
of the government's response to any unrest in Xinjiang.

Future of the Muslims of the Region

In the 1980s China temporarily relaxed it's policy towards the Muslims of Xinjiang. As the region
opened up, and as some Muslims were allowed to travel to Makkah for Hajj, the people
established contact with the wider Muslim world. Many Uighurs who made the trip brought back a
renewed sense of a wider Islamic identity. This along with the news from the neighbouring lands
of Central Asia of the political struggle taking place to unify the Muslims of the region, has given
the peoples of Xinjiang a clearer direction of their future. Just as the arrival of Islam as a away of
life in China previously provided justice and a vision for the entire region, and beyond as well as
moulding the people into a single Islamic ummah. Across the region and the entire world the call
for a return to that same way of life under the Islamic Khilafah system grows from strength to
strength. It is this system that we must work for, not simply because it will solve our problems but
because it is the greatest obligation upon our neck. It is this vision, to seek the pleasure of Allah
(Subhana wa ta ala) that the Muslims must work to realize.