Published by: World Tibet Network News, Tuesday, March 26, 1996

>From the Eastern Turkestan Information Bulletin,

Vol. 5 Number 5 December 1995

The following account of an ethnic Chinese who defected to Kazakhstan was published in the Uighur language newspaper Yengi Hayat (New Life) on September 16:

My name is Yu Jun Fu. I am a Chinese. I graduated from the English Department of Xinjiang University in 1984 and worked for the Science and Technology Committee of the Xinjiang Region from 1984-91. In 1988 I was sent by the Committee to Hong Kong for training in international trade.

While I was in Hong Kong the Chinese students' democratic movement erupted in Beijing. I took part in demonstrations organized in Hong Kong in support of the Beijing students. Agents working at the Xinhua News Agency in Hong Kong were aware of my activities and I was forced to return to China. Escorted by a Chinese agent I was brought to Guangzhou where my passport was canceled and I was detained for 30 days.

I was then sent to Xinjiang where I was held for 70 days until I gave a written pledge of my loyalty. I was freed but I was not allowed to return to my pervious job. During my detention I had been interrogated, beaten and tortured. In January 1992 I found a way to defect to Kazakhstan where I am now living.

In China Uighurs, Tibetans, Mongolians and minorities in general are not given equal treatment with the Chinese in all walks of life. this fact is well-known to the majority of China's common people. Minorities are usually treated like dirt, backward and primitive.

I was born in southern Xinjiang. I grew up among Uighurs. It gave me the opportunity of learning about Uighur traditions, culture and civilization. These are very rich, but the Chinese authorities are systematically destroying them. Uighurs have no rights at all in their own country. Most jobs are given to Chinese leaving Uighurs jobless. Uighurs in the countryside are especially poor. Many Uighur children have no chance to attend primary schools so illiteracy among Uighur is very high. Official Chinese policy is to keep the Uighurs ignorant.

Health care for Uighurs is almost non-existent. people suffer from all kinds of diseases as a result of nuclear testing carried out in Xinjiang yet there is no medical attention for these suffering Uighurs.

If Uighurs protest these inequalities they are arrested, tortured and executed, charged as "counterrevolutionaries." In this way hatred for the Chinese grow among Uighurs. Many Chinese living in Xinjiang believe that unless something is done to correct these unjust policies, Xinjiang could become an area of major conflict.

The same situation prevails in Tibet and Inner Mongolia. I met with many Tibetans in Beijing and Chengdu. They had come out of Tibet with their families. Most of them looked as if they were sick of life. They are very poor and wear ragged clothes. They used to sell traditional Tibetan medicine and their handicrafts. They are constantly pursued by police because they do not have a license to sell. But in China proper it is virtually impossible for Tibetans, Uighurs or Mongolians to obtain a license.

A friend told me a story from the spring of 1993 when he was practicing in a hospital. A Tibetan youth of 24 years was brought to the hospital bleeding heavily from a stab wound in his back. He had been stabbed by a young Chinese business man. The doctors were unable to save the Tibetan's life.

My friend informed the victim's Tibetan friends who had brought him to the hospital and advised them to go to the police to file charges against the Chinese murderer. He was told that some Tibetans had already been to the police but the police would not listen. The Chinese police officers treated the Tibetans as "bad people." The next day about 60 Tibetans came to fetch the body of the dead Tibetan. When the authorities refused to release the body the Tibetans insisted and the police were called to disperse them. In the end the Chinese who had stabbed the Tibetan went unpunished and the Tibetans were not allowed to even take the body of their friend.

Uighurs, Tibetans, and Mongols are daily faced with this kind of injustice in all aspects of life. To the ordinary Chinese and Uighur remains a "dirty shish kebob maker" and Tibetans are "Lao Zhang" (dirty Tibetan).

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The aim of the Eastern Turkestan Information Bulletin is to disseminate objective current information on the people, culture and civilization of Eastern Turkestan and to provide a forum for discussion on a wide range of topics and complex issues. ETIB is published bi-monthly by the Eastern Turkestani Union in Europe(ETUE), established January 11, 1991 in Munich, Germany.

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