There are riots in China's northwestern Xinjiang region today with 140 reported killed and over 800 injured, reports the Wall Street Journal. "Witnesses said the conflicts pitted security forces against demonstrators, and members of the region's Turkic-speaking Uighur ethnic group against members of the country's Han Chinese majority. Many among the predominantly Muslim Uighurs have chafed at Chinese government rule."
Good thing those Uighurs aren't terrorists or violent.
"Uighur activists said hundreds of Uighurs, many of them students, had gathered Sunday to protest racial discrimination and call for government action against the perpetrators of an attack last month on Uighur migrant workers at a toy factory in southern China."
The story goes on to report that "Demonstrators clashed with the police, witnesses said, and rioters smashed shops and attacked buses. 'Most were young Uighurs. They were smashing everything on the street,' said one Han Chinese man who works as a driver. Another Han Chinese man, who owns a shop in the city's central bazaar, said he saw Uighurs 'with big knives stabbing people' on the street. "
I'm sure these guys are NOTHING like the Gitmo Uighurs who are innocent people who pose no danger whatsoever regardless of the fact that they were trained in terrorist tactics in Tora Bora.
No worries. Peace out.
12 comments:
is this post serious? i mean, a protest in china becomes a riot, and then the chinese autorities unleash security forces who fired on the crowd leaving 140 dead and 800 injured. somehow that means that the uighurs detained seven years ago in gitmo must be terrorists? is there any connection at all except for the fact that they belong to the same ethnic group? and how does 140 uighurs being shot by chinese security forces make them terrorists? (aside from the fact that the chinese government is calling the protesters that to justify the killings)
i honestly can't tell if this is a real post, or not. it's like a parody of a stupid conservative.
Do you know what happened in the South Chinese factory? A mob lynched seven Uighurs.
Do you know who is who among the dead?
Do you know just how the Han Chinese go into the Uighurs'area?
No? I din't think so, or you wouldn't have written what you have. If you are comfortable being a propagandist for the Communist Chinese government, then I wonder how it is that you feel comfortable living here.
And upyernoz, trust me, she is serious.
Michilnes, You owe me an answer on a question before you disappeared for while. You responded to the following. But my question is, how can anyone take you seriously, when you think a 4 year old from California was selling secrets to the Soviets? So I believe your views on the world are a little convoluted
Once again, I've been waiting for your answer, but you never replied back in May. So, to remind you, I went and found the following exchange.
michilines said...
G.R, at the time, John Wlker Lindh was fighting on OUR side. Until 9/11. Then we joined the former Soviet side, which we had been funding against for years . . .
G.R., why do you think the Bush administration put a gag order on him?
May 19, 2009 10:57 PM
G.R. said...
@ Michiline,
My mind was spinning trying to understand what you were saying I plumb missed this tidbit of misinformation in your comment.
"G.R, at the time, John Wlker Lindh was fighting on OUR side. Until 9/11. Then we joined the former Soviet side, which we had been funding against for years . . . "
WHAT? I think you got your Johns mixed up.
John Walker was the Navy warrant officer who sold us out to the Soviets and was convicted, and should have been executed, in
1985, four years after John Walker Lindh was born.
John Walker Lindh was some kid from Califonia, born in 1981, who went to Afghanistan to train with the Taliban, and was captured by U.S. forces he was fighting against.
If I were a lousy teacher who teaches revised history, I would have given you an A+.
But I'm not, so I will have to give you a failing grade.
May 20, 2009 6:59 PM
Oh good lord michilines...who picked up your hateful rock and let you back out?
G.R., you and I both know that we were talking about two different people. I am sorry that I didn't follow up and explain that to you, though I'm sure you knew it all along.
Again, I am sorry for the confussion. I was speaking about a man who was helping the same people our government had funded against the Soviets for years. Then in 2001, the sides got turned around on him.
I'm sorry you have waited so many days and nights for that. I only read Pat's blog when she's supporting the Chinese government, so I missed your lonesome plea.
Thanks Pat, for the compliment. So, how do you get along in the U.S.A. being a Chinese propagandist? Do they pay you or do you do it voluntarily?
Do you value freedom of religion? If so, you must know that the government you are helping doesn't allow any religious practice. They have been doing the same thing as the soviets did -- they move Han Chinese into non-Han areas to suppress the majority.
You can be cute and try to treat me like a troll, but seriously , think about what and who you are supporting. For all we know, your post could be translated and published across China right now to prove that people here support their suppression. Is that wht you really want?
And btw Pat, if you want, I can ask one of my Chinese students to do a search and see if you are famous in China.
Just let me know.
You can sling mud, or you can look at the facts. The facts are we do have video footage of the protests. You can see some of it at http://www.newsy.com/videos/china_riots_two_very_different_stories. It shows Uighers flipping cars and smashing things. It doesn't show any police brutality. And believe me, if they could show it they would.
You can believe the Uighers when they say they're innocent of incitement, or you can look at the evidence the Chinese government has gathered proving this was in fact orchestrated by the Uighers. You notice the majority of the victims of the violence were Han.
This has nothing to do with freedom of religion. This is about rioters bringing violence to their homes and then crying to the international community when the government cracks down.
Yes, there's some story about Han violence against Uighers at a factory. Until I see evidence of the story I'm skeptical. This riot wasn't an attempt to right a wrong. It was just wrong.
Yes, there's some story about Han violence against Uighers at a factory.
yeah, even the chinese authorities admit that two uighurs were killed there. and there's video of that too. and there's photographic evidence that more were killed: "But photographs that appeared online after the battle showed people standing around a pile of corpses, leading many Uighurs to believe that the government was playing down the number of dead Uighurs."
the thing is, there's a long history here. during the 1990s the chinese wages a long bloody crackdown against the uighurs and the uighurs went underground and set off bombs. in those days the uighurs were strongly supported by conservatives in the u.s., but since 9/11 the american right has basically sold the uighurs out. the chinese have regularly staged violence and doctored crime scenes to pin violence on "uighur separatists." what happened last august in kashgar is a perfect example.
a lot of conservative bloggers just discovered the uighur/west turkistan conflict this year becuase of the release of uighur detainees from gitmo. their opposition to that release has made a lot of them swallow uncritically the rather suspect spin of the chinese government as they cut off internet access and cells phones from all of xinjiang provence to make sure than only their version of events gets out into the world.
the crackdown by the communist leaders of china is being supported by the american right. strange bedfellows indeed.
Pat,
You should watch the NewsHour tonight on PBS. There was a very good discussion about the Uighur situation.
If you missed it, they usually have a transcript up fairly quickly.
You could learn a lot from it.
Ah yes, The News Hour on PBS. Probably the most unbiased, snicker snicker, news source.
By the way Michilines, so I will know who you were talking about, what was the name of the "a man" you were talking about, because you most certainly said, "John Wlker [sic] Lindh was fighting on OUR side. Until 9/11. Then we joined the former Soviet side, which we had been funding against for years . . ."
So until you can clarify that, your credibility is questionable.
GR,
JWL had it all figured out.
He was there. You weren't.
G.R., I was an adult during the late '70's and 1980's so I lived through what was happening in Afghanistan while it was happening.
The U.S. didn't stand idly by when the Soviets invaded. And unfortunately, some of the same people that we backed, were later the Taliban. (And of course that's not the only time we've supported the wrong side -- we back the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia against the Vietnamese.)
Additionally, I know people, both from different parts of the former Soviet Union and the Afghanistan region.
I don't really care if you think I have credibility or not. Anyone can decide that for themselves.
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