China issues white paper on Xinjiang

Freedom of religious belief protected

China said Thursday the freedom of religious belief is protected in Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region as the country issued a white paper on the human rights progress made in the region.

The white paper was released less than a week after Ramadan started on Saturday in China. The Chinese government has for years been battling rumors that the country prevents Muslims from observing the holy month.

The country forbids Party members from observing Ramadan as they are supposed to be followers of Marxist doctrine, an atheist ideology.

However, the normal reli- gious needs of local people have been satisfied, according to the white paper titled “Human Rights in Xinjiang – Development and Progress,” which was issued by the State Council Information Office on Thursday in Beijing. Xinjiang has published translations of the religious classics of Islam, Buddhism,

and Christianity in multiple languages, it said, adding that 1.76 million copies of the Koran and Selections from Al- Sahih Muhammad Ibn- Ismail al- Bukhari have been printed and distributed.

Religious organizations have organized training courses on religious knowledge and etiquette for citizens with religious beliefs.

“Legitimate rights of religious organizations have been effectively safeguarded,” the white paper read.

Xinjiang has 112 religious organizations, which receive help from the government to improve their conditions and allow them to play a broader role, it said.

Steady improvements have been made in the training system to cultivate clerics, by offering them systemic training, enhancing their overall qualities, and raising religious organizations’ capacity of self- management, the white paper said.

It noted that overseas religious exchanges have been conducted in increasing depth. Xinjiang has sent delegations to international academic exchanges and seminars, and its clerics and students at religious institutes have won prizes in competitions for reciting the Koran.

Since 2001, Xinjiang has sent more than 70 clerics and students from the Islamic Institute to study at institutions of higher learning in Egypt, Pakistan, and other countries, and has set up scholarships to award those who achieve outstanding performance, said the white paper.

Moreover, the local government has implemented a policy on planning and organizing pilgrimages to Mecca, and has strengthened services to ensure that all such pilgrimages are safe and orderly, it said.

The white paper also said religious extremism has been curbed in accordance with the law in Xinjiang.

“Extremist forces distort Islamic theology, bewitching the public, and force their extremist ideas on others,” said the white paper.

“They have masterminded largescale incidents of violence and terrorism, injuring and killing innocent people of any ethnic group, even their fellow Islamic clerics and Muslims,” it said.

To ensure the citizens’ right to freedom of religious belief, Xinjiang has worked hard to combat extremism, implementing the Regulations on Anti- extremism of Xinjiang, strengthening the management of religious affairs in accordance with the law, and preventing and neutralizing religious extremism, which have effectively curbed its spread, it said.

China also published white papers on Xinjiang’s religious freedom and ethnic equality, unity and development in 2016 and 2015.

Shifting focus

The white papers are necessary to present a true and complete picture of Xinjiang’s human rights development, Li Yunlong, a professor at the Party School of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, told the Global Times.

For years, many foreigners only knew about Xinjiang from Western media, which mostly focuses on the region’s ethnic issues and terrorist attacks, and shaped biased or prejudiced impressions, which is unfair to the people in the region, Li said.

What is most important about Xinjiang residents’ human rights protection are issues that directly relate to local residents’ life and happiness, such as the employment situation and social security system, as well as residents’ participation in national governance, experts said.

Buwajar Abla, a national political adviser from Xinjiang, told the Global Times that the happiness of Xinjiang residents has increased enormously, after progress on economic development, medical care and ecology development.

According to the paper, the incidence of poverty in Xinjiang had dropped to 10 percent or less by the end of 2016, and at the end of 2016, the registered urban unemployment rate in Xinjiang was 3.22 percent.

Meanwhile, the language, culture and customs of people from ethnic minority groups has been protected, which is also progress worthy of praise for local people’s self- identity, Buwajar noted.

Buwajar, who is also a professor at Xinjiang Agriculture University, added that the economic progress made in Xinjiang came against many obstacles, as they were starting with a weak economic foundation, severe ecological situation and low education levels.

Xinjiang’s annual GDP in 1978 was only 3.9 billion yuan ($ 573 million), which soared to 961.7 billion yuan in 2016, and annual per capita GDP in the region rose from 313 yuan to 40,427 yuan during the period, according to the white paper.