China: Situation of Uyghurs COI Compilation April 2016
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BEREICH | EVENTL. ABTEILUNG | WWW.ROTESKREUZ.AT ACCORD - Austrian Centre for Country of Origin & Asylum Research and Documentation China: Situation of Uyghurs COI Compilation April 2016 This report serves the specific purpose of collating legally relevant information on conditions in countries of origin pertinent to the assessment of claims for asylum. It is not intended to be a general report on human rights conditions. The report is prepared within a specified time frame on the basis of publicly available documents as well as information provided by experts. All sources are cited and fully referenced. This report is not, and does not purport to be, either exhaustive with regard to conditions in the country surveyed, or conclusive as to the merits of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum. Every effort has been made to compile information from reliable sources; users should refer to the full text of documents cited and assess the credibility, relevance and timeliness of source material with reference to the specific research concerns arising from individual applications. © Austrian Red Cross/ACCORD An electronic version of this report is available on www.ecoi.net. Austrian Red Cross/ACCORD Wiedner Hauptstraße 32 A- 1040 Vienna, Austria Phone: +43 1 58 900 – 582 E-Mail: [email protected] Web: http://www.redcross.at/accord Commissioned by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Division of International Protection. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author. Table of contents List of Abbreviations ........................................................................................................................ 3 1 The Uyghur People .................................................................................................................. 4 1.1 Origins ................................................................................................................................... 4 1.2 Population ............................................................................................................................ 6 1.3 Language .............................................................................................................................. 7 1.4 Religion ................................................................................................................................. 9 1.5 Relationship with the Chinese government ..................................................................... 10 2 Background information on China and XUAR ...................................................................... 17 2.1 Geography .......................................................................................................................... 17 2.2 Demography ....................................................................................................................... 21 2.3 Legal and governmental structure .................................................................................... 24 2.4 Political landscape .............................................................................................................. 29 3 Security Situation in China and its potential impact on the Uighur people ....................... 33 3.1 Overview of the current security situation and relevant actors ..................................... 33 3.1.1 General security situation .......................................................................................... 33 3.1.2 Non-state actors ......................................................................................................... 41 3.1.3 State security forces ................................................................................................... 47 3.2 Violent incidents 2013-2016 ............................................................................................. 51 4 Human Rights Situation in China (including the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region) ... 65 4.1 Freedom of expression, including, Internet and media ................................................... 65 4.2 Right to access information ............................................................................................... 71 4.3 Freedom of assembly ......................................................................................................... 74 4.4 Freedom of movement ...................................................................................................... 75 4.5 Freedom of religion ........................................................................................................... 78 4.6 Exercise of political rights .................................................................................................. 86 4.7 Access to labour and education ........................................................................................ 87 4.8 Harassment, threats and discrimination .......................................................................... 97 4.9 Torture and ill-treatment .................................................................................................. 99 4.10 Death penalty ........................................................................................................... 101 4.11 Due process and access to justice ........................................................................... 103 4.12 Situation of women and children ............................................................................ 105 4.12.1 Impact of the Family Planning Policy on Uighurs ................................................... 113 4.13 Forced return and deportation of Uighur refugees to China ................................. 117 5 Sources ................................................................................................................................ 123 2 List of Abbreviations CCP - Chinese Communist Party, also: CPC - Communist Party of China ETIM - East Turkestan Islamic Movement ETIP - East Turkistan Islamic Party ETIPA - East Turkistan Islamic Party of Allah ETLO - East Turkestan Liberation Organisation ETPRP - East Turkestan People’s Revolutionary Party IMU - Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan MPS - Ministry of Public Security MSS - Ministry of State Security NPC - National People’s Congress PAP(F) - People’s Armed Police (Force) PCC - Production and Construction Corps PLA - People’s Liberation Army PRC - People’s Republic of China TIP - Turkestan Islamic Party XPCC - Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps XUAR - Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region 3 1 The Uyghur People 1.1 Origins The ethnic origin of the Uyghur people has been “contested […] among Uyghur and Chinese scholars, as well as among other scholars of Uyghur history” (Tursun, 2008, p. 92). In his 2010 book Uyghurs: Strangers in Their Own Land, Gardner Bovingdon, an associate professor of Central Asian Studies at Indiana University (USA), includes a detailed discussion of the historical emergence of the Uyghurs. As Bovingdon notes, some “Uyghur nationalists posit that Uyghurs emerged very early, possibly some six thousand years ago” while other “nationalists claim more recent descent from the Xiongnu, a confederation of peoples who engaged in a ‘tug of war’ with the Han dynasty [206 B.C.–220 A.D.] for control of Xinjiang”. However, as Bovingdon points out, “the term Uyghur (variously Weihe, Yuanhe, and Huihe in Chinese sources) is found no earlier than the fifth century”. (Bovingdon, 2010, p. 27) An entry on the Uyghur people in the Encyclopædia Britannica, a general knowledge encyclopedia currently published in the USA, states that Uyghurs are mentioned in Chinese records dating from the 3rd century A.D. (Encyclopædia Britannica, 9 March 2015). A Radio Free Asia (RFA) overview of the Uyghurs notes that the name “Uyghur” “first appeared in the Orkhun Kok Turk inscriptions and in early medieval Uyghur, Manichaean, and Sogdian scripts, as well as in Arabic-Persian scripts” (RFA, 9 July 2009). James Millward, a professor of History at Georgetown University (USA) who is specialised in the history of China and Central Eurasia, writes in his book Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang (2007) that the Uyghurs originated in the “Mongolian core lands of the Orkhon River valley”. As he notes, the tribes known by the name “Uyghur” were “former components of the Türk khaghanate” and were “not Muslims, but rather Manichaean” (Millward, 2007, pp. 42-43). As James Millward and Peter Perdue, a professor of History at Yale University (USA), write in an earlier book chapter in Frederick Starr’s Xinjiang: China’s Muslim Borderland (2004), the Uyghur “[w]ith other tribes, […] overthrew the Türk ruling house and in 744 established an empire of their own based in central Mongolia that eventually extended into northwest China, Zungharia, and at times as far west as the Fergana valley” (Millward/Perdue, 2004, p. 40). In 840, this Uyghur empire (khaghanate) was in turn destroyed by what Millward refers to as a “massive attack by the Kyrgyz (Qirghiz)” (Millward, 2007, p. 46). This resulted in the emigration of many subjects of the former Uyghur empire into Gansu and Xinjiang. Thus, as Bovingdon notes, “only in the ninth century did peoples bearing the collective name Uyghur settle in the Tarim Basin” (Bovingdon, 2010, p. 27). As Millward notes, the main group of Uyghur tribes of the former Uyghur empire “resettled in lands straddling the Tian Shan” in today’s Xinjiang area (Millward/Perdue, 2004, p. 40) and established