The New Dominion

Last Friday, Nur Bekri delivered some grim words to reporters regarding security in Xinjiang, stating that the overall situation would be more “severe” in the coming months. His gloomy outlook got considerable international coverage, and so yesterday, in what I interpret to be a slightly ham-fisted attempt to compensate for the negative press coverage, China media organs published five, count ‘em, five articles in English on some stereotypical highlights of Xinjiang. All in a single day. Two of these covered recent efforts to improve regional infrastructure and the job market, but the other three seemed to be cookie-cutter pieces about religion and harmony in Xinjiang. And so, for your reading pleasure:

Xinjiang is a harmonious melting pot of world religions! This article is actually quite useful in that it outlines what local authorities understand to be the history of religion in the region. Its a basic rule of thumb that, as far as the local government is concerned, the “history” of Xinjiang is supposed to reflect what the situation is today (take, for example, China’s rule over Xinjiang, which, since it was “always the case,” is justified today). That being said, the ebb and flow of different religions to and from Xinjiang is portrayed as a natural and relatively non-violent process, and that the bottom theme to it all is that although “the dominance of a particular religion has kept changing from time to time in Xinjiang, but the coexistence of multiple religions following the introduction of outside religious faiths has never changed.”

Muslims have a legendary place of pilgrimage near Turpan! To be honest this article was also pretty informative, and was about the Al-Sahab Kahfi Mazar located in Tuyugou, which is a small Uyghur village just outside of Turpan. According to Izizbul Imin Haji, the sheikh in charge of the mazar, the seven sons of the King of Yemen travelled the world seeking the Creator. The eventually took refuge with a king in what is now Xinjiang but decided to flee on realizing the king’s wicked ways. They hid in a cave, went to sleep, but woke up to find that 309 years had passed. After dying, the holy men were allegedly buried at this tomb. Also of note is the aversion that local Uyghurs supposedly hold for the nearby Thousand Buddha Caves, which they consider to be a haven for Satan.

Uyghur Muslims lead unhindered spiritual lives at places like the Id Kah Mosque! This is a brief history of the Id Kah mosque and glimpses into the lives of Uyghurs who go there to worship. As with the previous two articles, I learned something here as well; apparently the Id Kah started as a small place of worship in a graveyard which is now buried under what is Old Kashgar.  And the courtyard itself was made by the donations of a Uyghur woman named Gulminar in 1798.

Xinjiang will weather the economic crisis by improving its transportation infrastructure! Just as President Obama is attempting in the United States, the government of Xinjiang plans on creating jobs by making massive improvements to the transportation infrastructure this year. Work will continue or begin on a total of 15 railway lines, one of which will decrease transit time from Beijing to Urumqi from 36 to 12 hours. Which I must say would be mind-blowingly awesome. Highway coverage is to increase to 140,000 km and 18 new airports will be built making Xinjiang the region with the most airports.

College graduates in Urumqi are guaranteed to get a job within 12 hours of applying! Yeah, you read it right. Recent graduates who apply to the government are guaranteed to get at least one job offer within 12 hours. All of them. The article admits that a lot of them will immediately be sent out of Urumqi to fill job vacancies in the countryside, but nonetheless I find this whole thing so unbelievable I wish I could find more about it. Oh, and yes, ethnic minorities take priority.

And so, in sum, Xinjiang’s a pretty nice place, right? Days after Nur Bekri invokes the specter of terrorism, separatism, and religious extremism as bearing down indomitably on Xinjiang’s stability, state media mobilizes to emphasize for English language speakers how open religious life is and how content Muslims in Xinjiang are. To be completely fair, the picture of Xinjiang painted on March 10th wasn’t entirely flowers and kittens, as part of this China Daily article on increased measures against drug trafficking admitted candidly that Xinjiang is facing the worst drug and HIV situations within China. Nonetheless, the rapid succession of “happy Muslim articles” that occurred yesterday leads me to suspect that the state media wasn’t quite prepared for the degree that Bekri’s foreboding would be covered internationally.