dogu-turkistan-sempozyumu

FREEEAST TURKISTAN SYMPOSIUMThe Uighur-dominated oases of the region, due to their superior agriculturaland mercantile economies, were frequently over-run by nomadic powers fromthe steppes of Mongolia and Central Asia, and even intermittently, Chinesedynasties, who showed interest in controlling the lucrative trade routes acrossEurasia. According to Morris Rossabi, it was not until 1760, after the defeat ofthe Mongolian Zungars, that the Manchu Qing dynasty exerted full and formalcontrol over the region, establishing it as their “new dominions” (Xinjiang); thiswas an administration that lasted barely 100 years before it fell to the Yakub Begrebellion (1864-1877) and expanding Russian influence. 14 Until major migrationsof Han Chinese were encouraged in the mid-nineteenth century, the Qing weremainly interested in pacifying the region by setting up military outposts whichsupported a vassal-state relationship. Colonization had begun with the migrationsof the Han in the mid-nineteenth century, but was cut short by the Yakub Begrebellion, the fall of the Qing empire in 1910, and the ensuing warlord era, whichdismembered the region until its incorporation as part of the People’s Republicin 1949. Competition for the loyalties of the peoples of the oases in the GreatGame played between China, Russia and Britain further contributed to divisionsamong the Uighur according to political, religious, and military lines. The peoplesof the oases, until the challenge of nation-state incorporation, lacked any unifiednational identity, yet they did share a strong sense of what Hobsbawm would laterdescribe as “proto-nationalist” yearnings.Thus, the incorporation of Xinjiang for the first time into a nation-staterequired an unprecedented delineation of the so-called nations that were involved.The re-emergence of the label “Uighur”, though arguably inappropriate as itwas last used 500 years previously to describe the largely Buddhist populationof the Turfan Basin, was popularly adopted as the appellation for the settledTurkish-speaking Muslim oasis dwellers. This has never been disputed by thepeople themselves or the states involved. There is too much at stake for the peoplelabeled as such to wish to challenge this identification. For Uighur nationaliststoday, the direct lineal descent from the Uighur Kingdom in seventh centuryMongolia is accepted as fact, despite overwhelming historical and archeologicalevidence to the contrary. 15 This is not unlike the Han Chinese belief they they,too, are descended directly from the Han dynasty rulers, itself a multi-ethnic andlargely non-Chinese empire.462