Inter-ethnic tensions remain high as Xinjiang marks key anniversary

Channel News Asia

By Jeremy Koh, Channel NewsAsia
POSTED: 01 Oct 2015 14:53

URUMQI, China: China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region on Thursday (Oct 1) marks the 60th anniversary of its founding. While it may be a time of celebration, tensions are high in the regional capital Urumqi, which in 2009 was rocked by violent riots that revealed deep-seated ethnic tensions.

Six years on, observers say distrust between the main ethnic groups has grown, and tensions could still easily spill over into violence.

Madam Turdi resides in an apartment in Urumqi’s Shuimogou district, which has been hailed as a model for ethnic harmony due to the make-up of its residents.

The 71-year-old Mdm Turdi has been living in the block for the past 20 years, and among the 53 households 37 belong to Han Chinese, 9 to Uighurs, with the rest belonging to Huis and Uzbeks.

And Mdm Turdi, who’s a Uighur, has also done her bit to promote ethnic unity. Over the years, she has helped to babysit six Han Chinese children. She has also adopted one Han Chinese boy who was abandoned.

“I didn’t think about whether it was a Han or a Uighur,” she said. “The bag that the baby was in had Chinese words. It said that the baby does not have parents and whoever picks him up to please take care of him.”

Mdm Turdi’s block is the only apartment building in the district where the different ethnic groups live together. The residents were assigned to their homes by their work unit, a transport company, in 1994.

“In this compound, we don’t differentiate between the Uighurs, the Hans and the Huis,” said Dong Zhifang. “For instance, during meal times, we come down and eat together and have fun.”

But beyond the confines of the compound, the reality is a lot less harmonious. In Erdaoqiao, for instance, is one of the main Uighur neighbourhoods in the city. But it is also where violent riots broke out in July 2009 between the Hans and the Uighurs, leaving more than 180 dead.

Today, many Han Chinese still avoid the area. “I wouldn’t dare to go,” a Han Chinese passerby told Channel NewAsia. “We don’t feel very good about them. We are definitely afraid.”

In fact, there are few Uighurs to be seen in the Han Chinese areas of the city.  "After 2009, even if Hans and Uighurs work together, there won't be much interaction beyond the office,” said Professor Wu Chuke, Minzu University of China. “Over the years, the gulf between the Hans and the Uighurs has widened.”

Prof Wu says this distrust is one of the biggest issues facing Xinjiang today. And one way to improve the situation would be for the government to re-look its preferential policy for minorities including the Uighurs, or to even remove it.

"We thought we were doing good by giving them preferential policies, benefits and subsidies because their population is small,” he said. “But such policies have failed to touch people’s hearts, and it makes people think, is that our status in society?”

But even if the policies were tweaked, Prof Wu expects that implementation of the policies at the local level could be flawed. So in the near future, Urumqi could still remain a tale of two cities, split along ethnic lines.

- CNA/rw