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Updated Saturday, July 11, 2009 9:34 am TWN, By John J. Metzler, Special to The China Post

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Cultural fault lines jolt China

Interestingly the Turkish government (who has a non-permanent seat on the Security Council) grandstanded and called for the Xinjiang violence to come before the U.N. Security Council. While Turkey's Islamic-lite rulers have long been enchanted with Turkic communities in Central Asia, their sentiments have never forgotten the “brothers in East Turkistan.” Beijing stopped the diplomatic proposal cold.

Naturally the PRC rulers blamed the violence on what the communist party calls “the three forces” of terrorism, separatism and extremism at home and abroad.

China has regularly raised the specter of Al-Qaida and other Islamic terrorist groups as a convenient cat's paw to slap down any opposition. Since the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks on America, this became an easier task just as it is for Moscow. While some Uighurs have been linked to Al-Qaida (even some in Guantanamo Bay) this is a minority. Separatism is a broad-brushed charge aimed at anyone among China's fifty-five “minority groups” who does not willingly fit into a neat folkloric and ethnic cookie mold of the communist rulers.

As to extremism; look at Beijing's hysterical condemnations of the World Uighur Congress to see how “extremists” are variously viewed as both ungrateful and vicious.

An official communique added with characteristic PRC polemic, calling on comrades for “holding high the banner of ethnic unity” and carrying on the tradition that people of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang “breathe together, share the same destiny and have their hearts linked to each other.” In many ways Xinjiang is more of a dagger to the heart of Beijing than Tibet. It's bigger, more populous, with Islamic fervor compared to Buddhist tolerance, and borders nations that were once bridling under Soviet rule but are now independent.

Geopolitically, Xinjiang is nothing short of vital; it holds large oil fields, China's nuclear testing facilities at Lop Nor and the space facilities. It borders seven countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Mongolia, Russia and former Soviet republics Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

The rifts between Uighurs and Han Chinese have less to do with ideology than with cultural and religious issues, recalling Samuel Huntington's “Clash of Civilizations.”

As with last year's disorders in Tibet, the Xinjiang violence has tarnished the myth of communist China's “multi-cultural” harmony. It's a jolting wake-up call.

John J. Metzler is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues.

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