dogu-turkistan-sempozyumu

FREEEAST TURKISTAN SYMPOSIUMhouses and even physical appearance and behaviour of th eUyghur people. Thestate authorities regularly examine the imams to understand their politicalpoints of view and instruct them to carry out “self-criticism” sessions. They exertinspection on the mosques, dismissing religious teachers and students from theschools, and control the literature and poems in terms of political attitude; anydissatisfaction in the practices of the Beijing government is considered to beparamount to “discrimination” which is a crime against state security that canbe punished with the death penalty. Respective reports reveal documentationof some cruel practices; these are considered to be “official secrets”. “Thesedocuments used to circulate only between the party and the government, as theyconsidered extremely sensitive documents” said Adams. “These documents werearbitrarily used in order to create a legal basis for targeting Uyghurs, preventingthem coming together and talking about and expressing the problems they wereencountering or expressing their cultural identity in an independent manner.”One such reports reads: “A manual that is used for the inspection of religionmatters in Xinjiang contains open-ended “offences” which enable officials to denyreligious freedom in any form. Samples of respective offenses can be listed as:“using religion to encourage separatist elements and reactionary elements, to carryout other activities that are harmful to the good order of society, the production,life, and to be involved in criminal activities.” Any item to be published (includingnews and articles) that is related to research or appraisal of Islam must uphold theMarxist point of view of religion, and use the yardstick of the religious policiesand regulations of the party and the government. An article co-signed by thevice-director of the Xinjiang Re-education through Labor Bureau reveals that asof 2001 almost half the detainees who were serving time for crimes of separatismor religious-linked offenses were detained on charges of “[belonging to] illegalorganizations and [engaging in] illegal religious activities.” “The supervision onreligion is so oppressive in Xinjiang that it creates a legal network which enablesthe official authorities to arrest and arrest almost anyone they want to see as atarget” says Hom.The Human Rights Watch Committee and the Human Rights Organizationin China have made calls for pressure to be applied to China in order that thegovernment put an end to these restrictions and abandon discriminative policiesand implementations that have been imposed against the Uyghur people. The528