East Turkistan

he north, Mongolia to the northeast, and Kirghizstan and Tajikistan to the northwest and west. To the west and southwest lie Afghanistan and Pakistan, and to the south are Tibet and India. East Turkistan is a vast land of 640,000 square miles -- one sixth the total of all China. Geographically, it is China’s largest province. Mountains ring most of the land. To the north and northeast lie the Altay Mountains. The Tarbaghatay Mountains are in the northwest, forming part of the border with the former Soviet Republics. To the south are the Tibetan ranges: the Pamirs, the Karakorams, and the Karanghu (Kunlun) Mountains. To the east are the Altun Mountains which complete the circle. Only a few natural corridors pierce this wall of mountains. The Gansu corridor links the province to China proper, through the Gobi Desert. While Beijing has sought to strengthen that link, mountain passes to the north and west provide far easier access to the outside world -- a fact which has shaped commerce, culture and history through the centuries. Still another range of mountains, the Tangri Taghliri (Tian-shan), runs east to west across the province forming two basins: the Dzungharian Plain to the north and the much larger Tarim Basin to the south. Each basin has its own desert, but by far the largest desert -- the Taklamakan ---- is to be found in the extremely arid Tarim Basin. It is the largest desert in all China. The extent of the deserts in East Turkistan is the most dramatic demonstration of the dryness of the climate. Far from any ocean, East Turkistan receives little rain. Its winters are cold and summers hot. But for the rivers, fed by melting snow found on the surrounding mountains, much of East Turkistan would be completely unlivable. The People

To meet an East Turkistani is to know instantly that those who live in Sharqi Turkistan are not Chinese. While they suffer under the rule of what can perhaps be seen as the last great empire on Earth, East Turkistanis yearn for the day when they can once again guide the course of their own nation. As its traditional name implies, East Turkistan is a Turkic country populated primarily by Muslims who can trace their history back to at least the 7th century. Culturally, linguistically, even economically, East Turkistan is tied far more closely to nations which lie to its north and west than to its current overlord, China

The largest ethnic group in East Turkistan are, as noted, the Uighurs -- a Turkic people whose history reaches back more than 2,000 years. During the eighth and ninth cena steppe. Eventually, after their defeat in 840 A.D. by the turies the Uighur Empire dominated the MongoliKirghiz, the Uighurs moved south -- settling in East Turkistan and becoming part Karakhanid Empire. (Other Uighurs settled in of the Turkic what is now China’s Gansu province. Though they speak Chinese, they still see themselves as descending from the Uighur people.) The History

The Mongol Empire swept into East Turkistan early in the 13th century, and for the next 500 years East Turkistan was part of what became know as the Turkic - Mongol Empire. One of the striking aspects of this period was the extent to which the Mongols adopted Turkic culture: militarily triumphant they rapidly became assimilated. The Manchus, having conquered China, invaded East Turkistan in 1759, dominating it until 1862. During this period the Turkic people of Eastern Turkistan rebelled 42 times. In 1863, with the help of the Ottoman Empire, East Turkistanis expelled the Manchus, founding the independent state of East Turkistan, under the leadership of Yaqup Beg Bidowlet. The new state established diplomatic relations with the Ottoman, British and Russian Empires; however, the maneuverings among the Great Powers led to a new Chinese invasion in 1876 -- this time with the support of the British who feared the expansion of Russia. China regained control of East Turkistan the next year and formally annexed the province in 1884 -- giving it the name Xinjiang. East Turkistan was under the rule of Yang-zen-shen between 1911 and 1927. Nationalist Chinese, under the leadership of Sun Yat Sen, overthrew the Manchu Empire in 1911, establishing the Republic of China. Encouraged by the turmoil inside China, East Turkistanis again rebelled. A rebellion under the leadership of Mohammed Amin Bughra, the Amir of Khotan in 1933. In 1933 they were able, briefly, to establish an independent East Turkistan Islamic Republic headquartered in the city of Kashgar. The leaders of the Islamic Republic of East Turkistan, 1933, Kashgar. Second from right, Sawut Damollam, the Prime Minister. Ghoja Niyaz aji, the President of the Islamic Republic of East Turkistan. In 1944, their rebellion had greater permanence: the East Turkistan Republic set up in that year in three of the provinces districts (centered on the Ili Valley) lasted until 1949 when the Soviet Union supported the newly victorious Communist rulers of China in reacquiring total control. In 1955, Beijing renamed the province Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. Natural Resources

Agriculture in the province depends on irrigation fed by rivers flowing from the mountains and oases. Crops include winter and spring wheat, corn, rice and millet. The province’s farmers are a major producer of long-fiber cotton for China; fruit from the region such as the seedless grapes of Turfan, melons of Artush and Peyzawat, and apples of Ghulja are well known. The province is one of China’s biggest producers of livestock. Large numbers of sheep, cattle, horses, goats, donkeys, camels, mules and yaks are to be found grazing on the provinces vast natural grasslands. Potentially of greatest importance is the natural wealth to be found beneath the land -- a fact not lost on China. The province is rich in uranium, platinum, gold, diamonds, rubies, emeralds and and other precious stones. Iron, lead, copper, silver, sulphur, tin, and mica are abundant as well. Most significantly, East Turkistan has vast and largely untapped deposits of coal and reserves of oil. China estimates that one third of its total coal and oil is to be found within the province. By the year 2000, confirmed oil reserves are expected to reach 6.5 billion tons -- along with billions of cubic meters of natural gas. According to The Washington Post, "oil in China’s Tarim Basin may contain nearly as much crude as Saudi Arabia." Despite the natural wealth of East Turkistan, the Turkic people of this land remain poor, living in what China itself acknowledges to be one of its poorest provinces. Indeed, according to China’s own statistics, 90 percent of the Turkic people live below the nation’s poverty line.