China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

[radon]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

i have no intention of causing disturbance here,

Then you proceed to go on a rant. Is this like when you posted that you have no intention of discussing your ideology and then go ahead and do exactly that?

why is china the number one trade partner with US again? is US the number one evil capitalist country, in the eyes of the communists?

why is china the number one trade partner of Japan? is Japan the number two capitalist market?

why is china the number two trade partner of europe? is europe the father of capitalism?

so far, have they demonstrated repeatedly that they are communist in name, but realist in practice?

Well, we can agree on one thing. They are, and always have been in my opinion, communists in name only. So china's government is not dogmatic because they trade with other countries? Is that is your point? Sounds like a non sequitur to me.

could it be that nationalism is the mainstream in china at this time? could it be that majority of chinese do not like the way the west had treated them in the past? could it be that in the last 10 years or so, the "coalition of willing" have demonstrated their hypocrisy of "spreading democracy" by invading iraq and killing iraqis, which cause them to rethink the motive of western politicians advocating "democracy" in developing world? could it be that they learned the lesson from Russia that after the USSR collapse and they fully adopted the western system and standard, then found their wealth fleeced by the west and their national security seriously compromised by the ever expanding NATO, and figured that the west would not stop just at "democratizing Russia" and instead until their country disintegrated, not ever being a threat to the western interest?

I think it has more to do with things like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananm...otests_of_1989

When I see other political parties arise to compete with the communists, and perhaps even displace them, I'll believe people have an actual choice in the matter.

Since when does NATO or anything else you brought up have anything to do with whether the average person in China can be a part to the political process. 90% of that paragraph was hard to read and added nothing to your argument.

in a so-call democracy society, is it true that the government represents the interest of the majority? if so, then their politicians or government officials' action is the reflection of the people. if not, then why is better for you to have a government that only in-name is democratic?

It is not necessarily true. I'm not sure what you are implying here. Maybe you should read up about different systems of government. Consider the republic with an emphases on the tyranny of the majority.

for all you comments, i found this most ignorant, offending, and stereotypical. i feel from all my previous posts, there nothing should leave this impression, so i take it as a blanket statement you will put forth towards any chinese people. while the chinese did have this attitude(do the americans have this "center of the world" attitude at present?) two hundreds years ago, which caused them dearly, i do believe we have learned our lesson. i believe you do see many chinese international students in most of prestigious universities around the world learning science, engineering, business, law, and even politics(oh, yes, they are indeed free to go anywhere).

Pot, kettle. Your posts are peppered with "typical westerner". I would argue that there is no such thing. Even if there was I doubt I would fit the definition. Should I take it as a racist invective? Why is that every time anyone criticize the Chinese government people get all defensive? I would think it would be the opposite, it is not like they elected them.

If they had learned their lesson they would be less worried about becoming polluted by western influence. They don't seem to have a problem with crappy hip hop though. And yes the best and brightest do leave. Many do it because there are better opportunities abroad where intelligence and drive have some prayer of winning over politics and nepotism.

from your accusation of chinese(i guess you mean new immigrants) not feeling the need to learn the local language and assimilate themselves into the local society, i don't know where you get this impression from.

You're not blocking enough news. You need to clamp down on those pesky foreign journalist types roaming around. Those countries are being invaded and their native populations displaced, and the indigenous people should be happy about it?

while it is true we have china towns everywhere and people in those towns do speak mostly chinese. but do you know that these people tends to be the ones with poor education or with limited financial means to learn new language skills as they have to get a job(even minimum wage) right away to support themselves after landing in the new country?

Like Tibet or Xinjiang? This thread isn't about San Fransisco.

do you know that in the early days, chinese new immigrants face the worse kind of racial discrimination comparing to other racial groups, even the blacks(for example in canada, they were the only ones subject to head tax, and in US they were facing Chinese Exclusion Act)? for them to survive, with no english skills(there was no support from the government at that time), most of them end up working and living in chinatowns, where they at least feel home, being somehow respected.

Your going to have to do better than that if you want to make me feel guilty enough to accept your position. May I suggest rational dialogue as an alternative.

however, this does not hold true to the second generation chinese immigrants. most of them after enduring all the hardships when they were young, they become professionals, and are well respected in the mainstream society. do you know the fact that chinese students achive higher admission rates in US universities than the average? do you know that there is high ratio of chinese scientists and professionals working in silicon valley, and US universities? do you know that the controller, John Chiang, who tells Arnold that california has no money to pay its creditors is a chinese? same as the secretary of energy Steve Chu, and former secretary Elaine Lan Chao, and former governer current secretary of commerce Gary Locke.

the examples are abundant, and i really don't know where your accusation coming from.

Perhaps from the numerous times I see someone bandy about how china has 5000 years of culture and that it is so great that they don't need to pay attention to the world around them.

Your examples have nothing to do with the premise since you rambled on quite a bit. All in all they say more about the goodness of the American, especially college level, education system than it does about china.

saying something different from your view point is spreading idealogy? care to read more carefully of my posts?

No, but saying that you aren't going to do something then proceeding to do it is not going to fool anyone. I recognize its rhetorical value but in this case it is overused.

is being ignorant, having no understand of other people's mind and action, and hoping the world circle around you a risk? to me it is.

So why is china doing it?

do i get pay to post here? being a member for 3 months, and only have 46 posts, and probably about 10 of them are about politics, i guess my labor is highly regarded by the commies.

I doubt this is your only board.

[touchring]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Tibet is rather unfortunate, because of its strategic location, it will either be under the control of the Anglo Saxon powers, now represented by India, or China. Many Tibetan territories such as Sikkim are already under Indian rule.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibet#19th_century

18th century


Royaume de Thibet ("Kingdom of Tibet") in la Chine, la Tartarie Chinoise, et le Thibet ("China, Chinese Tartary, and Tibet") on a 1734 map by Jean Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville, based on earlier Jesuit maps


In 1705, Lobzang Khan of the Khoshud used the 6th Dalai Lama's refusal of the role of a monk (although the incumbent did not reject his political role as Dalai Lama) as an excuse to take control of Tibet. The regent was murdered, and the Dalai Lama sent to Beijing. He died on the way, also near Kokonor, ostensibly from illness. Lobzang Khan appointed a new Dalai Lama, who, however, was not accepted by the Gelugpa school.
A rival reincarnation was found in the region of Kokonor. The Dzungars (one of the Mongol tribes) invaded Tibet in 1717, deposed and killed a pretender to the position of Dalai Lama (who had been promoted by Lhabzang), which met with widespread approval. However, the Dzungars soon began to loot the holy places of Lhasa which brought a swift response from Emperor Kangxi in 1718, but his military expedition was annihilated by the Dzungars not far from Lhasa.^[24][25]
Emperor Kangxi finally expelled the Dzungars from Tibet in 1720 and the troops were hailed as liberators. They brought Kelzang Gyatso with them from Kumbum to Lhasa and he was installed as the Seventh Dalai Lama in 1721, though they did not make Tibet a province, allowed it to maintain its own officials and legal and administrative systems, and levied no taxes.^[24][26] However, the Manchu Qing put Amdo under their control in 1724, and incorporated eastern Kham into neighbouring Chinese provinces in 1728.^[27] The Qing government sent a resident commissioner, namely Amban, to Lhasa. In 1751, Emperor Qianlong installed the Dalai Lama as both the spiritual leader and political leader of Tibet leading the government, namely Kashag.^[28]
While the ancient relations between Tibet and China are more complex, there is generally little doubt regarding the subordination of Tibet to Qing China following first decades of the 18th century.^[29] In 1788, Gurkha forces sent by Bahadur Shah, the Regent of Nepal, invaded Tibet, occupying a number of frontier districts. The young Panchen Lama fled to Lhasa and Qing Emperor Qianlong sent troops to Lhasa, upon which the Nepalese withdrew agreeing to pay a large annual sum. In 1791 the Nepalese Gurkhas invaded Tibet a second time, seizing Shigatse and destroyed, plundered, and desecrated the great Tashilhunpo Monastery. The Panchen Lama was forced to flee to Lhasa once again. Emperor Qianlong then sent an army of 17,000 men to Tibet. In 1793, with the assistance of Tibetan troops, they managed to drive the Nepalese troops to within about 30 km of Kathmandu.^[30]
The 18th century brought Jesuits and Capuchins from Europe who gradually met opposition from Tibetan lamas who finally expelled them from Tibet in 1745. However, at the time not all Europeans were banned from the country — in 1774 a Scottish nobleman, George Bogle, came to Shigatse to investigate trade for the British East India Company, introducing the first potatoes into Tibet.^[31]

19th century

However, by the 19th century the situation of foreigners in Tibet grew more tenuous. The British Empire was encroaching from northern India into the Himalayas and Afghanistan and the Russian Empire of the tsars was expanding south into Central Asia and each power became suspicious of intent in Tibet. Sándor Kőrösi Csoma, the Hungarian scientist spent 20 years in British India (4 years in Ladakh) trying to visit Tibet. He created the first Tibetan-English dictionary.
By the 1850s Tibet had banned all foreigners from Tibet and shut its borders to all outsiders.
In 1865 Great Britain began secretly mapping Tibet. Trained Indian surveyor-spies disguised as pilgrims or traders counted their strides on their travels across Tibet and took readings at night.

20th century


Francis Younghusband


In 1904, a British expedition to Tibet under the command of Colonel Francis Younghusband, accompanied by a large military escort, invaded Tibet and reached Lhasa. The British were spurred in part by a fear that Russia was extending its power into Tibet, and partly by hope that negotiations with the Dalai Lama would be more effective than with Chinese representatives.^[32] But on his way to Lhasa, Younghusband slaughtered many Tibetan troops in Gyangzê who tried to stop the British advance.

Sera Monastery, Lhasa, Tibet (2006)


When the mission reached Lhasa, the 13th Dalai Lama had already fled to Urga in Mongolia, but Younghusband found the option of returning to India empty-handed untenable. He proceeded to draft a treaty unilaterally, and have it signed in the Potala by the regent, Ganden Tri Rinpoche, and any other local officials he could gather together as an ad hoc government. The treaty made provisions for the frontier between Sikkim and Tibet to be respected, for free trade between British and Tibetan subjects, and for an indemnity to be paid from the Qing court to the British Government for its expenses in dispatching armed troops to Lhasa. The provisions of this 1904 treaty were confirmed in a 1906 treaty Anglo-Chinese Convention

signed between Britain and China. The British, for a fee from the Qing court, also agreed "not to annex Tibetan territory or to interfere in the administration of Tibet", while China engaged "not to permit any other foreign state to interfere with the territory or internal administration of Tibet".^[33][34] The position of British Trade Agent at Gyangzê was occupied from 1904 until 1944. It was not until 1937, with the creation of the position of "Head of British Mission Lhasa", that a British officer had a permanent posting in Lhasa itself.^[35]
André Migot, a French doctor who travelled for many months in Tibet in 1947 described the complex border arrangements between Tibet and China, and how they had developed:

"In order to offset the damage done to their interests by the [1906] treaty between England and Tibet, the Chinese set about extending westwards the sphere of their direct control and began to colonize the country round Batang. The Tibetans reacted vigorously. The Chinese governor was killed on his way to Chamdo and his army put to flight after an action near Batang; several missionaries were also murdered, and Chinese fortunes were at a low ebb when a special commissioner called Chao Yu-fong appeared on the scene.

Acting with a savagery which earned him the sobriquet of "The Butcher of Monks," he swept down on Batang, sacked the lamasery, pushed on to Chamdo, and in a series of victorious campaigns which brought his army to the gates of Lhasa, re-established order and reasserted Chinese domination over Tibet. In 1909 he recommended that Sikang should be constituted a separate province comprising thirty-six subprefectures with Batang as the capital. This project was not carried out until later, and then in modified form, for the Chinese Revolution of 1911 brought Chao's career to an end and he was shortly afterwards assassinated by his compatriots.

The troubled early years of the Chinese Republic saw the rebellion of most of the tributary chieftains, a number of pitched battles between Chinese and Tibetans, and many strange happenings in which tragedy, comedy, and (of course) religion all had a part to play. In 1914 Great Britain, China, and Tibet met at the conference table to try to restore peace, but this conclave broke up after failing to reach agreement on the fundamental question of the Sino-Tibetan frontier. This, since about 1918, has been recognized for practical purposes as following the course of the Upper Yangtze. In these years the Chinese had too many other preoccupations to bother about reconquering Tibet. However, things gradually quieted down, and in 1927 the province of Sikang was brought into being, but it consisted of only twenty-seven subprefectures instead of the thirty-six visualized by the man who conceived the idea. China had lost, in the course of a decade, all the territory which the Butcher had overrun.

Since then Sikang has been relatively peaceful, but this short synopsis of the province's history makes it easy to understand how precarious this state of affairs is bound to be. Chinese control was little more than nominal; I was often to have first-hand experience of its ineffectiveness. In order to govern a territory of this kind it is not enough to station, in isolated villages separated from each other by many days' journey, a few unimpressive officials and a handful of ragged soldiers. The Tibetans completely disregarded the Chinese administration and obeyed only their own chiefs. One very simple fact illustrates the true status of Sikang's Chinese rulers: nobody in the province would accept Chinese currency, and the officials, unable to buy anything with their money, were forced to subsist by a process of barter."^[36]

In 1910, the Qing government sent a military expedition of its own to establish direct Chinese rule and deposed the Dalai Lama in an imperial edict. The Dalai Lama once again fled, this time to British India, in February 1910.

[radon]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

I am not trying to debate what happened to the native indians I think the history is clear. The point I was trying to make is that a people with land and an ability to produce income or shelter off that land have no real incentive to rebel. I am led to believe from the MSM and other sources that a lot of the rebellion in China comes from the system of land rights. The government owns all the land and can dole out use agreements as it sees fit. This has produced politicians giving out land rights to build Factories, Damns, Highways and Condos and resentment from people who have traditionally used the land and produced from it that are evicted. All part of the central planning process. As China becomes more progressive in respecting property rights, which they have been trying to do in order to stay competitive in the current world market, I think they will eventually include land rights. But as this is a basic socialist tenant it will be hard to do and will take time. England has a similar system of leaseholds but the difference is the land is owned by a private person (who just never wanted to sell limited land on an island) and they collect rent from it for up to xx amount of years (XX varies by leashold). The difference in England is that a governmental decrie cannot kick somone off the land and ruin their income stream, farming or family home. The deal has been set as per the lease all parties know the limits of the transaction and can pay a negotiated price for said right. I will be more bullish on China if they continue to press through with the land reform process. I am less bullish on the West as they diminish property rights.

Sorry, the first part of my post was almost complete satire. I should have made that clear. I agree with you to some degree, but land reform without addressing corruption will archive little. The poor will still get shafted.

[radon]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

We have only one hard and fast rule here at iTulip: respect your fellow members.

Keep the argument on the topic of ideas not the persons making the argument.

Imagine that the exchange is not anonymous but is face to face.

Carry on.

I am critical of China's government and aspects of its culture. In no way did I mean anything I wrote as a personal attack on anyone, and I hope that it wasn't taken that way.

I have seen this pattern many times. Someone criticizes the Chinese government and many people become offended. Then comes cries of racism and how the west has exploited china etc. This usually halts any useful dialog. When I see this I begin to question the motives of the poster.

If this is not the case then I apologize. I would also add that since this appears to be a "western" forum, posts critical of the government of any nation are bound to show up. Right now we are in a thread about china suppressing an ethnic riot for instance. I doubt they are rioting because they are happy that their football team won.

[MarkL]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

i can tell you the fact that majority of chinese support the current government, and if there is an election held at this moment, the communist will win.

Yea. Right. So why don't they hold an election?

It would give their government authority, appease many of the people that want reform, give them an incredible amount of credibility on the world stage.

But they don't!! Hmmm. There must be SOME reason...

[FRED]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

I am critical of China's government and aspects of its culture. In no way did I mean anything I wrote as a personal attack on anyone, and I hope that it wasn't taken that way.

I have seen this pattern many times. Someone criticizes the Chinese government and many people become offended. Then comes cries of racism and how the west has exploited china etc. This usually halts any useful dialog. When I see this I begin to question the motives of the poster.

If this is not the case then I apologize. I would also add that since this appears to be a "western" forum, posts critical of the government of any nation are bound to show up. Right now we are in a thread about china suppressing an ethnic riot for instance. I doubt they are rioting because they are happy that their football team won.

iTulip editorial policy has been for many years been critical of the Chinese government and supportive of the Chinese people.

We have a simple definition of a bad government: one that does violence to its own people. By this simple definition the CCP is a bad government.

[touchring]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Thanks for the clarification on the Han. But since you keep bringing up the native indian genocide the US did make reparations by giving land not under governmental jurisdiction and the native americans eventually built these:

[ATTACH]1797[/ATTACH]

I don't think they are interested in gaining control of the Motherland as they have their own land.

I just read that the Hui Muslim people are also targeted by the Turks mob, which would make it seems like East versus "West" conflict.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyghur_people

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

There is a synopsis of the Urumqi, Xinjiang riots at GenerationalDynamics.com that seems reasonable enough to me, from what little I know:

China's Xinjiang province is scene of violent anti-government protests

Xinhua reports that 156 people have been killed in Urumqi, Xinjiang's capital city. Over 1,000 people were injured in the riot, according to the official Chinese government statement.

China's Xinjian province is scene of violent riots and demonstrations (Source: CS Monitor)

The rioting occurs across an ethnic fault line. The Muslim Uighurs, of Uzbek origin, have historically occupied the Xinjiang region. However, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) government has been relocating Han Chinese into the Xinjiang region in order to dilute the Uighur population. The CCP has used the same policy to dilute the Tibetans in Tibet (the province just south of Xinjiang), with equal success.


From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this can never work You cannot resolve an ethnic fault line in a region by flooding the region with the favored ethnic group. Has this ever worked throughout history? I'm not aware of any example. All that this does is inflame the fault line so that it's worse than ever, leading to a crisis civil war.


The event that triggered the violence occurred on the other side of China last month. Two Uighur migrant workers, working in a toy factory Guangdong province in southeast China, were accused of raping a Han woman, a charge which appears to have been fabricated. The two Uighurs were killed in a Han Chinese mob attack on their dormitory, and nobody has yet been charged with the two murders.


This Sunday, thousands of Uighurs rioted and demonstrated against CCP rule in Urumqi. Xinhua reports that the Uighurs killed the Han in their homes, and that the Han are astonished by the ferocity of the attack by people who have been their neighbors. Apparently the CCP security forces struck back against the Uighurs violently.


Interestingly, the CCP has said that 156 people have been killed, but the casualties haven't been characterized, as to being Uighur or Han or security forces. The CCP is characterizing the riots as an uprising against Chinese rule, while the Uighur Congress in Exile is claiming that the police had opened fire on the demonstrators.


The Uighurs say that the CCP discriminates against them. They resent the flood of Han Chinese "colonizing" the region, taking all the good jobs, leaving the menial jobs for the Uighurs. They also point out that there's language discrimination, since few Han speak the Uighur language.


There are a lot of cross accusations, but they're probably all true on both streets. This is a generational crisis era for China, and a violent ethnic attack leading to a major civil war would not be a surprise to anyone familiar with Generational Dynamics.


Whether that happens this time cannot be predicted, and remains to be seen.


China has tens of thousands of "mass incidents" every year, but everyone is describing this one as "unprecedented," because of its severity and because it appears to be organized. There are late reports that it's spreading to Kashgar, in the southern part of Xinjiang. There were violent Uighur terrorist incidents in Kashgar just prior to last year's Beijing Olympics.


There's no doubt that the CCP is frightened. This was already obvious last month when China commemorated the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Now they've shut down mobile phones and internet access in Xinjiang, and they've arrested 1400 people. China has a history of violent rebellions and civil wars, and the senior citizens running the CCP in Beijing are very well aware that the government could collapse quite easily.

As I wrote in 2005 in "China approaches Civil War," and many times sense, Generational Dynamics predicts that China is headed for a new civil war with absolute certainty.

[touchring]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this can never work You cannot resolve an ethnic fault line in a region by flooding the region with the favored ethnic group. Has this ever worked throughout history?

This has not worked elsewhere in history, but this was how China was formed. The Uighurs have every right to be fearful that 1000 years from now, there wouldn't be an Uighur community in China, at least in the present form.

Do you know what the mass of territory from Hong Kong to Taiwan was not part of China until only 2000 years ago? Today, not a single person from that region will regard themselves as an alien, whatever the ancestry 2000 years ago.

[flintlock]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

No more oppressed than the minorities in the USA and Europe.

Ha, that's a good one.


All this going back in history to find people wronged. Pretty soon we'll have talk of how the Neanderthals were screwed over by Cro-magnon man.

Human history is nothing but conflict. That doesn't make what happened right, but trying to make things right is impossible and it would never end if taken to a logical conclusion. I say stick to the subject, which was the riots in China.

[skyson]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Urumqi: criticism and credit for the Chinese police By Peter Foster

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/pe...hinese-police/

[touchring]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Ha, that's a good one.


All this going back in history to find people wronged. Pretty soon we'll have talk of how the Neanderthals were screwed over by Cro-magnon man.

Human history is nothing but conflict. That doesn't make what happened right, but trying to make things right is impossible and it would never end if taken to a logical conclusion. I say stick to the subject, which was the riots in China.

I believe that the riots were started by a group of terrorists, maybe a few dozen of them - you don't see protesters in Europe carrying swords and hacking at people, killing a hundred people in 2 hours, don't you?

Furthermore, we all know that China is a police state - the fact that they could deploy 20,000 riot police within a day in just one city just shows the intense security presence within the city. We can deduce that the killing was done swiftly before the riot police were sent out of their barracks.

That among Uighurs there are terrorists and combatants is not far fetched since the Americans have caught 22 of them in Afghanistan fighting for the Talibans. The taliabn goals are to established the ideal Islamic state by means of war, whoever the opponent is, the chinese, the americans, the russians or even the moderate islamic governments.

Of course, there are also genuine Uighur protesters that numbered in hundreds and then grew to thousands unhappy over their plights.

Now the problem is that the communist authorities will not be able to differentiate between the terrorists and the real protesters. The end result will be that hundreds if not thousands of innocent people will be imprisoned and put away just because of what the few terrorists did.

There could only be one result for this Taliban styled operations - that real freedom, independence or autonomy for the Uighurs will be deferred by another 40 years.

[flintlock]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Do you know what the mass of territory from Hong Kong to Taiwan was not part of China until only 2000 years ago? Today, not a single person from that region will regard themselves as an alien, whatever the ancestry 2000 years ago.

The history of man is basically like this. Try looking at a map of the mass migrations of the Barbarian tribes in late Roman period. Huns, Visagoths, Ostragoths, Vandals, etc. Confusing as hell. We pretend to think we are all above this and too "civilized" but we're not.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:In...n_Empire_1.png

[Slimprofits]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

You know, you had me with you on the Uighurs, but dissing the Dalai Lama and the Tibetans? Gimme a freaking break. The f-ing ChiComs have no business in Tibet. No confusion as to who the bad guys are there.

Big hitter, the Lama.

Oh, uh, there won't be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.

[allenjs]

Re: China ethnic riots news capture (Warning: Graphic)

Please allow me to apologize, skyson, for some of the less than respectful comments of some of my fellow posters. I welcome your contributions here and read your good posts with pleasure.

It is likely true that the government of more or less every great nation has at times done things which are less than honorable to other peoples and nations. Certainly my country, America, is no exception of late. However we must be very reluctant to extend condemnation of such acts to general condemnation of the peoples of another nation.

Sorry I didn't reply sooner. I have been travelling meeting family and not closely watching message boards. I have some family members and colleagues in Urumqi, and can corroborate Skyson's initial assessment. Sadly, this is not a new problem.

The proximate cause of the latest riot was the rape of a Han Chinese woman by Uighars at a factory in Guangzhou, which caused serious rioting there and then caused ethnic tensions to flare up in far away Urumqui. IMO, the situation could have easily been diffused at the start if the Han authorities had acted swiftly, but they were so eager to avoid appearing anti-Muslim that they ended up explicitly protecting the rapists and appearing to side with the Muslims.

This situation is in fact rather different than times past, since it has been typical for the Chinese military to use extremely harsh force against the Uighars when they riot. This time, however, the Han death toll is slightly higher than Uighar, and the Chinese military is actively preventing the Han citizens from retaliating. The Muslims were well-prepared for the mayhem, while the Han were taken by surprise and did not anticipate that the military would not protect them this time. They only recently started trying to collect sticks and knives to defend themselves (both sides are very poorly armed, due to communist restriction on bearing arms).

I can tell you that Han Chinese have always had a lot of problems in Urumqi. For years now, it has been common knowledge that Han women are not allowed to shop in many of the markets without Uighar escort, or else the Han women will be raped and/or killed. This is just considered a normal situation, where Han Chinese cannot travel freely in the Muslim areas without guaranteed violence. In fact, the rape in Guangzhou has drawn some accusations that "it was the woman's fault", since she apparently should have known better than to be near to the Muslim men. It always shocks me that westerners will rush to judgment as if these Uighars are innocent and peaceful victims, when there is such a cultural and religious bias toward misogyny, violence, repression, and so on. These people are not rioting and raping for any of the high-minded reasons imagined by the moral relativists in San Francisco. They are doing it because it is their retrograde religion and culture.

Perhaps the new Chinese approach is to allow many Han Chinese to be martyred in order to draw international sympathy. I don't know. It seems like a stupid strategy to me, since everyone accuses Chinese of the worst anyway, and the retrograde Muslims there will never be appeased or peaceful until they are forced to shed their culture and religion. Only a Russia-style strategy will solve the problem.