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Before The United Nations
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The following are the remarks of Anwar Yusuf, president of the Eastern Turkistan Center, before The United Nations, Saturday, June 14, 1997.We like very much to keep it in our mind and remember it as one of important thing we done before the UN., we hope that we can do the same action every year before this international organization.
" I thank you for the opportunity to be here today at this important event. I am pleased to speak to the international community about a part of the world they usually don't hear of -- the part of the world that is my homeland: Eastern Turkistan. It is known to Chinese as Xinjiang province. And I am pleased to stand with others who call out for an end to Chinese occupation and repression of Tibet and Mongolia. And to stand with Taiwanese who also seek independence. China does not want the world to know about Eastern Turkistan. In fact, China does not even want the world to pay much attention to Xinjiang. It wishes this part of the world to stay invisible -- while the Chinese imprison, torture and all too often kill my countrymen with no justifiable cause, while the Chinese poison the environment, while the Chinese use my nation as a dumping ground for untold thousands of Laogai -- the world knows the word better as Gulag -- prisoners. According to Beijing, I am Chinese. But, look at me. I am not Chinese. I do not speak their language. I am connected through thousands of years of history to the Turkic family of nations. I am actually a Uyghur -- a race that reaches back far before the time of Ghenghis Khan, to the time of the Huns who Westerners know as the people who came from Asia to the Roman Empire. My language is Uyghur - Turkic. Indeed, my language is the root language for the group known to scholars as the Altaic languages. My religion is Islam. I ask you to look at me and to listen to me and to know my culture. I am not Chinese. I am Uyghur.
The Beijing authorities do not want you to hear these words or the words of my friends here today. They hope to suppress the true identity of Eastern Turkistan and make it Han. They hope to wipe out my culture, to deny my people their heritage, to deny them the most basic rights which Americans take for granted.Beijing will tell you that there are 8 million Uyghurs. We know that the figure is much higher: as many as 25 million. It is only one of many truths that the Chinese do not want the world to know. Let me tell you some of these truths. Eastern Turkistan was an independent state for many centuries. It was invaded and conquered by the Qing Empire in 1759. The Turkic people rebelled numerous times -- by one count 42 times. Finally, in 1864, the Turkic people succeeded in chasing the Manchus from their homeland. They founded an independent state which had diplomatic relations with the Ottoman Empire, Russia, and Great Britain. China returned, however, in 1877, again conquering my homeland. In 1884, China declared Eastern Turkistan to be China's 19th province, renaming it "Sinkiang." This means "new territory" or "new dominion." Eventually, the province became known as Xinjiang. After Sun Yat-sen and the Nationalists took power in 1911, East Turkistanis again rebelled. The Qumul Rebellion led to the creation of the Eastern Turkistani Islamic Republic in 1933. A second rebellion led to the creation of a free East Turkistan in 1944. These and other efforts were crushed by China, but they demonstrate the persistent and deep belief of my people that they are not part of China. Rule under the Communists has been particularly harsh. My land has become a dungeon for its people since 1949. Half a million Eastern Turkistanis have been killed. Hundreds of thousands have been sent to labor camps under the worst imaginable conditions. Three hundred thousand have fled to neighboring countries. China has attempted to destroy the Eastern Turkistani culture as well as its people. Eastern Turkistanis are forced to dress like Chinese, to speak, write, read, eat, sing, and dance like Chinese. China is importing millions of Han -- and at the same time forcing Eastern Turkistani families to limit their number of children. Authorities often forcibly sterilize parents and abort the unborn young. The authorities are also systematically attacking religion. As the Wall Street Journal has reported, Beijing has barred Muslims from prayer as part of their crackdown known as Strike Hard. Normally this repression is undocumented, but my organization has video tape of China's crushing of a 1995 rebellion in the city of Khotan. Today, Eastern Turkistan is one of the poorest parts of China. This is ironic since the land is rich with natural resources including uranium, platinum, gold, diamonds, iron, and silver. Geologists estimate that the province contains 1,600 billion tons of coal. One third of China's oil reserves are believed to be within Eastern Turkistan. In 1994, the Washington Post reported that "oil in China's Tarim Basin [the southern part of Eastern Turkistan] may contain nearly as much crude as Saudi Arabia." China's desire to exploit Eastern Turkistan's natural resources has been matched only by its desire to use the land as an environmental dumping ground. Most devastating has been China's nuclear testing program, centered at Lop Nor in Eastern Turkistan. No one knows exactly how many have been deformed or killed by China's nuclear activities. Some estimate 200,000 dead. What is clear is that the Lop Nor region has rates of cancer far higher than the rest of China. All these are truths about my homeland that China does not want known. Yet, we who believe in the future of Eastern Turkistan believe these truths will be known, and that Chinese rule of our land will end. As we have been forced into exile, our movement for a free Eastern Turkistan has become global. While we know the struggle for freedom is ours to win, we turn to the world community and to the great democracies like the United States for support. Two years ago, we established the Eastern Turkistan Center in Washington. Our tool is information, telling our story to political leaders, journalists, scholars and others. When they know the truth, they understand that my homeland deserves its freedom, we deserve the right to control our own future. I am honored to join others from Tibet, Mongolia and Taiwan who also seek to control their future. The Chinese Empire must come to an end. We raise our voices together to this purpose. Thank you.
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