dogu-turkistan-sempozyumu

Translated from Turkish by Yusuf Baybars OncuDr Meryem HakimIzmir University, Department of International RelationsEast Turkistan Kazakh IndependenceMovements in the 20 th CenturyThe Kazakh people, the second highest-populated ethnicity among theTurkish and Muslim peoples in East Turkistan, have a population in the regionthat totals 1,200,000. The Kazakhs of East Turkistan traditionally had a nomadicway of life, dating back to ancient history, and this they were able to sustain theirnomadic way of life until the early twentieth century. Thus, the Kazakhs of EastTurkistan have been able to preserve the characteristics of their ancient tribal life.Most of the Kazakhs in East Turkistan belong to the Orta (Horde-Orda) clan,one of the three main Kazakh clans, namely, the Ulu, Orta and Kichi. Almost allof the Kazakhs in East Turkistan belong to either the Kerey tribe of the Orta clanor the Alban or Suvan tribes of the Ulu clan. Thus, tribal life and deeply-rootednomadic traditions also affect the socio-economic union and social organizationsystems of the Kazakh people in East Turkistan.In Kazakh history, the lands that belonged to the Kerey tribe cover thegeography that extends from west of the Altai Mountains and Lake Zaysangtowards the east banks of the Irtis River and Omsk, in the north of Kazakhstan.However, it should be stated that until the second half of the last century theKazakhs of East Turkistan were no different in any aspect of their lives from theother Kazakhs who live beyond the official borders, namely, the Kazakhs in theformer Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan, which is located in the north-west of EastTurkistan, and the Kazakhs in Mongolia. The Kazakhs in East Turkistan have thesame supra-identity as the other Turkish and Muslim peoples of East Turkistanin the economic activities they carry out under nomadic conditions, as well as interms of faith, belief, ethnicity and linguistics. 1Unlike the dense population of the settled Muslim-Turkish Uyghur peoplewho live in the south of East Turkistan, the places where Muslim-Turk Kazakh383