The Olympic torch is in Xinjiang this week, visiting China's most northwestern province and readying itself for a trip south to Tibet. Xinjiang itself is a politically sensitive area; a large portion of the 8 million Uighurs (ethnically Turkic Muslims) there have been pushing for independence since its official bid for it in the 1940s. Violence has broken out in recent years there, and the Chinese government has allegedly foiled several terrorist attempts coming out of the region. According to government spokesman Wu Heping, the Uighurs are "a real terrorist threat".
Basically, Xinjiang is an area of China that has the potential to cause Tibet-like trouble but without the international fanfare (or Sharon Stone).
China has pulled out all the stops to make sure this leg of the relay goes smoothly, from upping the military presence to decreeing that locals (other than the Han Chinese, of course) stay indoors. (It kind of defeats the spirit of the torch relay if you don't let the locals come out and celebrate it, doesn't it? Maybe not if you don't think it's much of a celebration for the locals.)
James Reynolds, BBC's correspondent in China, has a really good take on it here. The most interesting point he brings up is this: if these Uighurs are such troublemakers, why do we have aboslutely no information on them? Kind of makes me think that maybe the Chinese government is exaggerating the threat to keep a tighter hold on power over there.
Slate also did a really enjoyable mini-series of articles on Xinjiang and Uighur culture a little while ago.
It's amazing by the way, how you can monitor the political situation here by how much internet access you can get. Last week and the week before, I could get to pretty much any site I wanted (except the ones that would be obviously restricted). Two days ago, the Wordpress and Blogspot go shut down. Today, the torch arrived in Xinjiang.
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