A state with global hegemonic ambitions needs both economic and military strength and the capacity to project its power externally.
China has achieved a strong economic growth, becoming the second largest economy in the world, and the United States has not been able economically to tackle it effectively. Therefore, China needs also to achieve an important global reach, starting with its westward march and projects such as One belt, One Road (OBOR).
In this frame, the northwestern region Xinjiang assumes a crucial geopolitical strategic importance for China.
Xinjiang, a predominantly desert region rich in energy resources, comprises 17% of the Chinese territory and is one of the poorest administrative entities in China, but with a high economic development. Xinjiang has assumed a significant importance due its natural resources, its borders with central Asian states extremely rich in natural resources and China’s new Grand Strategy focusing to the West.
In 2013 Xi Jinping announced Silk Road Economic Belt project aimed at connecting China with Central Asia and Europe through a number of infrastructures and communication network building. Xinjiang is strategically important for China because it should be the hub of trade with Central Asian and the the success of SREB it is directly linked to its stability.
Furthermore Xinjiang is playing an important role in Eurasian Corridor because six out of eight Sino-European railways originate from this region.
So, for the Chinese national interest, the region is essential for three reasons: it is rich in energy resources; acts as a northwestern buffer to protect the geopolitical core of China, close to the coast; it is the country’s gateway to Central Asia and the Middle East and therefore represents an essential junction of the terrestrial branches of the new silk routes (Bri) directed towards Europe. Therefore, the instability of this region can severely damage Chinese economic interests.
Xinjiang became an autonomous region of the People’s Republic in 1955. From the year 2000, Beijing encouraged the influx of Han (main Chinese ethnicity) into the region to fuel its economic development. In fact the Han are concentrated in the north, where the main oil fields are located. The problematic coexistence between Han and Uyghurs (Turkish-speaking and Muslim minority) is at the root of the region’s turmoil and instability.
Also, Xinjiang is a sensitive region for China due to its proximity with Afghanistan and Pakistan, which host a large number of terrorist groups, that can give ignition to the demands for a Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and that made Xinjiang fertile ground for the formation of terrorist groups such as the Islamic Movement of Eastern Turkestan and the Islamic Turkestan Party, responsible for attacks in China.
On July 5, 2009, in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang, 200 people died in clashes between the Han and the Uyghurs, in the most violent uprising recorded in the history of the western region of China. This was followed by some attacks in the region and in the rest of the People’s Republic, attributed to Uyghur jihadist cells. Between 2013 and 2014, some attacks of alleged Uyghur origin occurred in the region, in Beijing, in Kunming (in Yunnan) and in Guangzhou (in Guangdong). In the one that occurred at Kunming railway station (remembered as “Chinese September 11”) where men armed with knives killed 33 people.
So to secure this central piece of its Eurasian connectivity agenda, China needs to consolidate stability and its rule in Xinjiang. For this reason, Beijing closely monitors the border between Xinjiang and the Central Asian countries to prevent the return of the Uyghur jihadists who in the past years have joined the Islamic State or al-Qaida. Meanwhile, inside the region, Chinese security forces make extensive use of new technologies, starting with cameras equipped with facial recognition. Also the Chinese government created “educational camps” for the Uyghurs minorities in the region to uproot Islamic extremism and alleged cultural cleansing.
So Beijing is conducting a tough anti-terrorism campaign in Xinjiang, a massive surveillance activity and a “sinization” process to spread Han customs and habits. Meanwhile, China has rejected the allegation of detaining Uyghurs in internment camps. According to the official version, the so-called “vocational education camps” are centers where criminals and radicalized elements are “rehabilitated and reintegrated” in society by their will, through psychological assistance, legal, linguistic (Mandarin learning), historical knowledge, etc.
However, with the marginalization the Uyghur minority groups, China risks to treat only the symptoms of the problem, instead solving its causes. Also, such stringent security measures could lead to alliances among previously separate Uyghur activist group, with traditionally divergent demands.
The type of surveillance China has on the people of Xinjiang, and the other security actions it implemented, can be undoubtedly considered not in line with the standards of Human Rights.
But in the Human Right discourse however there is a knowledge power nexus for legitimizes the actions and a dichotomy in the language. China calls its actions on Xinjiang “Fight against terrorism” (Chinese government claims to have captured 13,000 terrorists from the region between 2014 and August 2019), whereas United States calls such actions “Human Rights Violations”.
In the case of Xinjiang, United States created a political discourse based on Human rights violation in order to legitimize a US actions in response to the Uyghur crisis. US Administration has taken actions against China on this issue with the Uyghur Act 2019, aimed to report the human rights violations in Uyghur, and to deny visas for some Chinese officials and Chinese Companies. Furthermore, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called China’s actions as a brutal, systematic campaign aimed to erase religion and culture in Xinjiang. And on July 2, 2019, the U.S. also criticized China for the re-education camps in Xinjiang during a closed-door meeting of the UN Security Council.
Meanwhile, the actions of India against Muslims, in the territory of Kashmir, are not recognized by the United States as human rights abuses. So it is evident that the United States’ reaction towards Chinese actions in Xinjiang, is due mainly to the the strategic importance of this region for China’s Westward march, that represents a threat to the world hegemony of United States. So the American pressure on the protection of human rights in the region is mainly grafted into the long-term competition between the top two powers in the world.