Myanmar Opposition Leader Returns Home. Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been detained since May, was discharged from the hospital Friday after undergoing surgery and returned to her home. Her doctor said she will be held under house arrest. [Associated Press headlines via GoUpstate.com]

12:48:35 PM    

Radio Free Asia's September report in pdf.

Some headlines include:

12:40:08 PM    

The breakneck growth of China's urban property markets in recent years has led to a wave of protests--including suicides--by those whose homes are threatened by local governments' development plans, RFA's Mandarin service reports.

The massive profits available to developers, local governments, and speculators with the urban real estate boom has made relocation a growth industry in itself, as governments contract the work of eviction and land clearance to real estate developers and specialized eviction companies.

The strong-arm tactics used by these companies often produces alienation and despair. On Sept. 25, a 35-year-old man from Beijing doused himself with gasoline and set himself alight in a desperate attempt to avoid eviction, as the developer's agents moved in on his house and family.

"The developer broke into our house and started to break windows," said Wang Suhua, the man's older sister. "That's when my smaller brother lit the gasoline." The eviction agent--apparently a migrant worker employed by the real estate company--also caught fire.

Wang Baoguang was admitted to hospital in a critical condition with burns to 65 percent of his body, she said. The property agent was also taken to hospital with burns. Wang's self-immolation comes just a week after a similar protest attempted by a man from the eastern province of Anhui, also prompted by a property dispute. Many more have been reported in other areas.

A few hours after the incident in Pingfang township on the eastern edge of Beijing, hundreds of local residents gathered in the neighborhood, preventing three police vans from leaving the scene. They showered the trapped uniformed officers with abuse, occasionally pushing them around.

Elsewhere in the city, around 100 residents of a Beijing apartment complex marched to city government offices to complain that they had been misled by the developer who built their homes. "We were promised a nice environment, with just a green area and a six-storey building in front of our apartments," said Ding Shufang, a spokeswoman for the mostly middle-aged protesters.

"Now the plan is to erect three tall buildings right in front of our homes, with 18, 16, and 11 storeys," she said. The protest was low-profile, without banners or slogans. The protesters managed to speak to municipal officials but were merely referred to another department. "Our next step could be to sue the property developer in court," said protester Yang Bingshi.

Such protests, and even self-immolations such as Wang's, are increasingly common in connection with property disputes across China. The requisition of land by local governments and state-owned enterprises has become one of the most controversial topics in both urban and rural areas as new roads, factories, and housing and office developments have sprung up nationwide.

Local residents evicted from their homes often complain of poor government compensation and forceful removals, while many accuse the government of cashing in on the real estate market at their expense. Some residents' groups have lodged class-action suits against local governments and developers.

Beijing attorney Gao Zhicheng said the now-widespread aggressive demolition and relocation practices are simply government-sponsored thuggery. "This is actually a large-scale, society-harming act practiced by developers and corrupt elements that is legally defined as a criminal activity," Gao told RFA.

"The frightening thing is the law’s inability to adapt to this situation. In some regions, if one uses demolition and relocation as an excuse to loot an area, he can almost avoid prosecution."

Many respected Chinese sociologists and legal specialists share Gao's view. The Xinhua News Agency's Banyuetan magazine recently hosted a conference on housing demolition and population relocation. Many attendees identified current practices as a major threat to social stability, because they violate constitutional freedoms which economic reforms have begun to make possible.

"This is something even more frightening than SARS," Gao said.

Copyright © 1999, RFA. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Asia, 2025 M St. NW, Suite 300, Washington DC 20036. http://www.rfa.org.

12:19:08 PM    

CHINA CHARGES CYBER-ACTIVIST WITH SUBVERSION
2003-09-26

A city government official in China's southwestern province of Sichuan has been arrested and charged with subversion after he expressed his political views on Internet chatrooms, RFA's Mandarin service reports.

Li Zhi, 32, was detained in August along with his wife, who was released on the same day, New York-based Human Rights in China said. Li's computer was confiscated, and he was formally charged with "conspiracy to subvert state power" on Sept. 3, it said.

Officials at the local Bureau of State Security declined to comment on the case. But an official at the Finance Bureau where Li worked before his detention said Li "deserved to be arrested.... You cannot compromise state security while chatting or disseminating information online."

China has kept a tight hold on Internet use by its citizens, for fear that its critics could organize themselves into an effective opposition and disseminate their views to China's fast-growing population of cyber-surfers.

Government filters block access to Web sites abroad run by dissidents, human rights groups, and some news organizations. The content of domestic sites is monitored and sometimes censored. Banned Web sites also include those offering pornography, and those belonging to banned organizations such as the Falungong movement.

The Chinese authorities are thought to have detained more than 30 people since the Internet boom began in the late 1990s, as part of its crackdown on online dissent. Overall, the government's policy has been to encourage the use of the Internet for business and educational purposes, but not for political discussion.

In June, four people who posted online messages in favor of political change were convicted by a Beijing court in June of subversion and sentenced to prison terms ranging from eight to 10 years.

Human Rights in China called on the U.S. government to put pressure on Beijing to release Li Zhi. "Monitoring e-mail and Internet chatrooms is an unacceptable invasion of privacy, and a reprehensible method of gathering evidence for prosecution of a political crime," Liu Qing, president of the rights group, said in the statement.

It noted that U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell urged his Chinese counterpart, Li Zhaoxing, at their meeting last week to ensure that Beijing acted on promises made in human rights talks last year. "We hope the government will take particular note of this case and press for the immediate release of Li Zhi," Liu said.

Copyright © 1999, RFA. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Asia, 2025 M St. NW, Suite 300, Washington DC 20036. http://www.rfa.org.

12:11:45 PM    

CHINA: XINJIANG RELIGIOUS FREEDOM SURVEY, SEPTEMBER 2003

By Igor Rotar, Central Asia Correspondent, Forum 18 News Service

The Xinjiang-Uighur Autonomous Region (previously known as Eastern
Turkestan) is situated in the north west of China and borders Kyrgyzstan,
Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Russia. With 16 per cent of China's territory, it
is the country's largest province. According to official Chinese
statistics, Xinjiang has a population of 16.5 million. Around half of the
population is Chinese, while the other half speak Turkic languages and
practise Islam. Of the latter, Uighurs constitute 42 per cent, the Kazakhs
6.2 per cent and the Kyrgyz 1 per cent.

Pervasive state control makes it difficult to collect information on what
the state regards as the sensitive issues of religious freedom or relations
between the Chinese state and Xinjiang's Muslim population. Almost all
those interviewed by Forum 18 said that if the authorities knew they had
supplied a journalist with "negative information", they could receive a
lengthy prison sentence. For that reason Forum 18 cannot reveal the names
of sources.

Historically, Eastern Turkestan is part of the same ethnic and cultural
region as Central Asia. The people of Turkic origin who live here have a
similar language, culture, customs and history to the native peoples of the
Central Asian republics. In ancient times, the Uighurs were rulers of a
powerful civilisation which extended not only to the whole of Central Asia,
but also to China.

In 1759 the Manchu Chinese forces overcame the resistance of the Uighur
army. The captured lands became known as Xinjiang (meaning "new border").
Since the incorporation of the region into China, the Uighurs have staged
more than 400 uprisings. In 1944 the Uighurs even managed to seize part of
Xinjiang and proclaim the Republic of Eastern Turkestan, but it survived
only until 1949.

Relations between the Uighurs and the Chinese became particularly strained
after 1950, when Beijing began the mass resettlement of ethnic Chinese into
Eastern Turkestan. While in 1949 around 200,000 Chinese lived in the region
(10 per cent of the population), today around 8 million Chinese live there
(around 50 per cent of the population).

Since the start of the 1990s Xinjiang has had a powerful separatist Uighur
underground movement. Acts of terrorism take place periodically and
spontaneous uprisings flare up. In 1990 a bus was blown up in Kashgar, the
main city in the south of the autonomous region, and again in 1992 in
Urumqi, the region's capital. In 1990, when the authorities closed off
access by believers to a mosque, an uprising broke out in the village of
Barin (a suburb of Kashgar). In 1995, when the authorities sacked the local
imam, an uprising broke out in the town of Khotan, 530 kilometres (850
miles) east of Kashgar. The most serious disturbances in recent years took
place in February 1997 in the town of Inin on the border with Kazakhstan,
390 kilometres (625 miles) west of Urumqi, where full-scale battles between
Uighur young people and the police raged for several days. The conflict
left 55 Chinese and 25 Uighurs dead.

The Chinese government views Uighur separatism as a serious threat to state
security. "Today you can criticise the communists privately, but to say
anything (even within one's own family) in support of Uighur independence
is to risk arrest," Uighurs told Forum 18.

At first glance Muslims in Xinjiang do not appear to be subject to any
persecution by the authorities. You can see working mosques virtually
everywhere in Kashgar. Forum 18 found that the number of functioning
mosques in Xinjiang is much greater than, for example, in Uzbekistan, where
the authorities are trying to limit the number of Islamic places of
worship. However, local Muslims told Forum 18 that the mosques are strictly
controlled by the authorities and all the imam-hatybs are appointed by the
authorities. As in, for example, Uzbekistan, a religious community can only
begin functioning once it has registered with the state authorities. In
every local district there is a state Islamic association that oversees the
life of Muslims.

The Chinese authorities also control the distribution of religious
literature. The owner of a Muslim bookshop in Kashgar, who preferred not to
be named, told Forum 18 that the state had compiled a list of religious
literature that was allowed in China. "If a book is found in my shop that
is not included in that list my trading licence will be taken away
immediately," the bookseller told Forum 18.

An unofficial order bans Muslims working in state-owned businesses from
visiting the mosque under threat of dismissal. Forum 18 saw posters on
mosques saying that anyone younger than 18 was not allowed to visit the
mosque. Schoolchildren are also banned from going to school wearing a hijab
(a traditional scarf worn by Muslim women that leaves only the face
uncovered). "I am a Muslim and I have to wear a hijab, but we are not
allowed to wear such 'ridiculous clothing' in school," a 15-year-old
schoolgirl told Forum 18. "Every day I go to school in clothes that a
Muslim woman ought to wear, and I only change into my horrible school
uniform when I reach the door!"

Uighur officials also practise guile. As soon as they retire they start
praying not five times a day, as Muslims are required to do, but 10 or even
15 times a day, making up for the lost years. It is worth noting that
people acted similarly in Central Asia during the Soviet era, where many
party officials became zealous Muslims once they retired. Chinese
propaganda proclaims that educated people, such as teachers, cannot be
believers, as this is a mark of ignorance. There was similar propaganda in
the Soviet era when, for example, a student at a higher education
institution seen attending a place of worship could be excluded from his
course, because by visiting a religious building he had "shown his
ignorance".

However, unlike neighbouring Central Asia, where today various radical
Islamic groups are very active, such groups have not become widespread in
Eastern Turkestan. For example, no Muslims Forum 18 spoke to in Xinjiang
had heard anything about the Hizb-ut-Tahrir party, an international Islamic
organisation very active in Central Asia despite being banned in all the
Central Asian states.

True, Forum 18 has established that recently so-called Wahhabis - Muslims
who adhere to the Hanbali school of Sunni Islam which is widespread in
Saudi Arabia - have appeared in Xinjiang ("Wahhabi" is also a term widely
used in Central Asia and incorrectly applied to Muslims who criticise the
official clergy). Although the Uighurs, like the Muslims of Central Asia,
belong to the Hanafi school, recently some young people in Xinjiang's
mosques have been performing their prayers in the manner of Hanbalis of
Saudi Arabia. Several local young people, like the so-called "Wahhabis" of
Central Asia, criticise expensive weddings and funerals and the worship of
mazars (the graves of holy people), because they believe such practices
violate the laws of Islam. At the same time, unlike in Central Asia, no
confrontations have been recorded in Xinjiang between the "Wahhabis" and
the Hanafis.

Another point of similarity with the situation in Central Asia is the
fierce hostility of local Muslims to the military action taken by the
United States and Britain in Iraq. Virtually all those whom Forum 18 met
believed that the US and Britain were guilty of the massacre of innocent
Iraqi Muslims. Forum 18's sources regarded the US as the enemy of Muslims
throughout the world.

It is worth noting that between 1983 and 1996 state officials and those
under 18 were not banned from attending mosques. Local people told Forum 18
that Muslims experienced no persecution from the authorities during this
period. It appears that in 1996 the Chinese authorities concluded that
Uighur separatism had a clearly religious foundation.

This is partially true. The Uighurs are much more zealous Muslims than
their Central Asian neighbours. The majority of local married women wear
the yashmak (which is rare in Central Asia), while middle-aged men prefer
to wear beards. Forum 18 often heard Uighurs say that their people "could
never live peacefully with the Chinese, because most of them are atheists".
A Uighur man, for example, will never go to a restaurant if the proprietor
is Chinese, because the food is not prepared according to the rules of
Islam.

The Chinese law restricting childbirth arouses great upset (although the
Uighurs, as a national minority, are allowed to have one child more than
the Chinese). "According to our Islamic customs, the more children there
are in a home, the greater the happiness. The Chinese law insults our
faith," Uighurs told Forum 18.

Forum 18 found that the overwhelming majority of Uighurs are strongly
hostile to the Chinese. For example, in Kashgar a Uighur will never get in
a taxi if the driver is Chinese, preferring to pay money to his
compatriots. "When they found out that I was friendly with Chinese people,
the Uighurs were so upset that they even wanted to beat me up. They felt
that Muslims have no right to have anything to do with the Chinese,"
complained one Kyrgyz businessman who works in Xinjiang.

The hostility towards the Chinese contrasts sharply with the tolerant
relations between Central Asian communities and the "Russian colonialists"
in Soviet times. One of the reasons is perhaps that Muslim teaching
recommends a more well-disposed attitude to Jews and Christians - the
so-called "people of the Book" - than to people professing other faiths.
Another reason is that in Soviet Central Asia there were no serious
demographic changes similar to those in Xinjiang (Kazakhstan is an
exception to this). In 1979 the percentage of Russians in Uzbekistan,
Tajikistan and Turkmenistan was no more than 12 per cent.

Even as it tries to reduce the Uighurs' religious commitment, the Chinese
government demonstrates a pronounced respect for their national culture.
Teaching in school and in further education establishments is in Uighur,
while there are Uighur television programmes and Uighur newspapers. In the
Chinese army special kitchens prepare food for Muslim soldiers.

Every year the Chinese authorities hold competitions for Uighur children.
The most gifted are given the option of attending prestigious colleges in
eastern China at government expense. Once they have finished their tuition,
the school leavers return to work in Xinjiang absolutely secularised and
distanced from the Islamic laws and completely assimilated into Chinese
culture.

At the same time as the government is trying to stamp out Uighur
separatism, it is pouring money into this backward province. The economic
progress is indeed impressive. When Forum 18's correspondent visited
Xinjiang in 1994 the main means of transport in the towns of the autonomous
region were horse-drawn carriages and bicycles. Today it has become
commonplace for local people to travel about in cars. Even Uighur
separatists admitted to Forum 18 that the standard of living in Xinjiang
has risen markedly over the past 10 years.

However, while pouring money into the Xinjiang economy, the government is
also trying to destroy traditional Muslim culture, Forum 18 was told. As an
illustration, local people cited the example of the area around the
historic Id-Kah central mosque in Kashgar. Six months ago this was a
traditional Uighur district with many shops and tea salons where Muslims
used to gather. Now the authorities have begun construction of a huge
supermarket on the square in front of the mosque. The shops and tea salons
have been destroyed under a city reconstruction plan. Speaking to Forum 18,
local people interpret these transformations as a deliberate attempt to
make the Muslim district conform to Chinese culture. For the time being at
least, the tension between local Muslims and the Chinese government has not
been relieved by Xinjiang's economic growth.

F18News http://www.forum18.org/

11:39:51 AM