The Narrative of Uyghur Terrorism and the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy of Uyghur Militancy

Abstract

This chapter provides a history of how Uyghur terrorism evolved out of a long-standing conflict between Uyghurs and states based in China through a combination of PRC policies to stifle dissent in Xinjiang and the state’s opportunistic use of the U.S.-led “global war on terrorism”. It critically analyses existing sources on the origins and evolution of two Uyghur militant organizations, the “East Turkestan Islamic Movement” (ETIM) and “Turkestan Islamic Party” (TIP), that China holds responsible for acts of terrorism in Xinjiang and argues that the Chinese government has grossly over-exaggerating the capacity of these groups in order to brand and suppress Uyghur dissent at home. By using the threat of ETIM and TIP to target all religiously inclined Uyghurs as potential terrorists, however, it has enabled a self-fulfilling prophecy of Uyghur radicalization and militancy.

Symmetric Interests and Attention Patterns in Asymmetry

“…Some writers claim an ongoing systematic replacement of Uighurs’ traditional values and language as many Uighur people have been put in mass internment camps (see Roberts 2020a, 2020b). Those not in the camps are also subjected to omnipresent surveillance and have been forcefully assimilated to erase their culture in their homeland (Roberts 2020a, 2020b; Svoboda 2021).…”

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“…[4] Counterproductive in that, given the predictable and well-established radicalising effects of such extreme and indiscriminate state coercion, it is likely to lead to more militant insurgent responses (Davenport 2007, 9-10;Roberts 2018b). Counterterrorism discourse may then end up being both self-fulfilling and, for the Party's settler-colonialist enterprise, self-exculpatory.…”

Securitization, insecurity and conflict in contemporary Xinjiang: has PRC counter-terrorism evolved into state terror?

“…Yet the current practice of religious securitization in Xinjiang far exceeds anything conducted by a Central Asian state in its indiscriminate targeting of Islam per se; and Central Asian actors may continue to resist religious securitization in a way that has become impossible in China. Most scholars agree that Beijing's goal here is to eradicate all possibility of political opposition in Xinjiang once and for all so that it can turn that territory into a stable platform from which to extend its Belt and Road Initiative (Brophy 2018;Clarke 2018aClarke , 2018bKlimeš 2018;Roberts 2018aRoberts , 2018b.…”

“…The evolution of PRC state discourses of counter-terrorism since 2001 has been examined elsewhere (Clarke 2018a(Clarke , 2018bRoberts 2018aRoberts , 2018b, and I will not revisit the detail here, other than to later highlight the contribution of Pablo Rodriguéz-Merino (in this issue) to that discussion. Briefly, while Chinese officials before 2001 sometimes referred to terrorism as a peripheral security challenge, mainly through Shanghai Cooperation Organization discourses, it was only after 9/11 that Beijing reframed its struggle with Uyghur 'separatism' as one against global terrorism (Clarke 2018a(Clarke , 4-5, 2018bRoberts 2018b, 104).…”