Hunt for Uighur riot leaders fuels divide
Published: July 24 2009 17:15 Last updated: July 24 2009 17:15

By Kathrin Hille in Kashgar

Yusup raises an eyebrow as he flips through the stack of identity cards on a small wooden desk before him. Barking names, he summons the passengers of a long-distance bus to check them against a most-wanted list on his laptop.

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Nearly three weeks after the riots, the hunt for those who took part, and for anyone else who may hold a grudge against the government and may pose a threat to public security, is in full swing. Southern Xinjiang, where indigenous Muslim Uighurs still account for the overwhelming majority of the population, is the focus of the crackdown.

Yusup, a Uighur policeman, takes his job seriously. “The people here out west are not good people,” he says as an explanation for the tight security checks, his lip curled with contempt. “I believe the police in your country are very gentle. We can’t afford to be like that. We ask them nicely once, and if they don’t obey, we get tough.”

This is evident along Highway 314, which runs all the way from Urumqi to Kashgar, China’s westernmost city, close to the border with Pakistan. At the checkpoints that police have set up outside big towns, Uighurs are ordered out of vehicles and many are kept behind while Han Chinese are allowed to travel on after registering.

Security gets stricter west and south of Urumqi, with Kucha and Kashgar virtually under siege. Hundreds of police with machineguns have been guarding the main square in front of the Id Kah mosque in Kashgar.

Kashgar and Kucha both have a record of violence. In the run-up to the Beijing Olympics last year, Kucha experienced a bomb attack, and a group of Uighurs stormed a police station in Kashgar, killing 16 officers.

The Uighur workers killed last month in a clash with Han Chinese in a factory in Guangdong – an incident seen as the trigger for the riot in Urumqi – were from towns near Kashgar.

In spite of the propaganda about ethnic unity that blankets the region’s airwaves, Han and Uighurs view each other with increasing suspicion. Prejudice, fervently denied but deep-seated on both sides, has broken into the open.

Han Chinese taxi drivers refuse to go to predominantly Uighur areas and Uighur restaurant owners view Han Chinese customers with suspicion.

For Yusup, who has sided with the Han-led Communist party, this makes life even more difficult. Many of the Uighurs he checks view him with resentment.

“People like him are worse than the Han. He is trying to be more Han than them,” says a young woman waiting to get her ID card back.

Yusup probably would not have ended up as a policeman elsewhere. He holds a diploma in mathematics from Xinjiang university, and speaks English and some Russian .

But, as for many other Uighurs, there were few chances of finding a job upon graduation. Yusup evades questions about this, but other Uighur graduates from Xinjiang university say they cannot find work in other Chinese provinces mostly because of their ethnicity and accent.

The police force offers a solution, with reasonable pay and a safe job. For Yusup, that is Rmb2,300 ($336, €237, £205) a month and a motorcycle. But he is paying a high price. “No girls want to marry men like us,” he says.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

From: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/82edabb8-7869-11de-bb06-00144feabdc0.html