Conclusion: Need for Moderation and a Humane Approach

Abstract

In multiethnic, multinational societies, minority concerns over their share in the political space, control over resources and protection of their identities (religious, linguistic) often contribute to political conflicts.² There is also a strong and positive correlation between ethnic conflict and ethnic nepotism measured by ethnic heterogeneity³ as with religious polarization and the risk of internal conflict.⁴ Minority grievances over the lack of political and civil rights, income inequality, and social fragmentation are especially conducive to internal unrest including civic strife and insurgency. With religious polarization, conflicts tend to get protracted as there could be a perception that the conflicting issues are indivisible and hence not amenable to settlement through negotiations.⁵ It is in this lens that the terrorist threat in China needs to be viewed. Undoubtedly, like many conflicts in other parts of world, the conflict involving Muslims in China is rooted in issues of national self-determination of a minority population. However, this is increasingly being overshadowed by religious undertones. Thus, today, the real threat stems not so much from Uighur nationalism but from their religiosity which unfortunately is under the influence of the ideology of global jihad.

Chinese hostility towards Islam and Muslims does not stop at the Chinese borders. Here is the so called dragon…joining a ferocious war against Muslims in Afghanistan and Pakistan alongside with the United States.

—The Turkistan Islamic Party, Islamic Turkistan, July 2009.¹