NPR: 20,000 Uyghurs live in Syria
US broadcaster NPR said the Uyghur community in Syria numbers around 20,000 people, including women and children, according to senior leaders in the group, noting that Uyghur fighters hope to attract more members of the Uyghur diaspora abroad to Syria.
After nearly 14 years of fighting, Uyghurs in Syria say, according to NPR, that they long to build new lives for themselves in Syria, preserve their culture, and practice Islam freely and fully without restrictions.
The US broadcaster said they have expanded the scope of their collective businesses, from importing cars to operating fuel stations, in addition to establishing several schools that teach in the Uyghur language.
Uyghurs began entering northern Syria through the Turkish border in 2012, after many faced difficulty obtaining residency in Turkey and feared being deported to China. Thousands settled with their families around Idlib (northwestern Syria) and Jisr al-Shughur (Idlib governorate, northwestern Syria).
The broadcaster said around 4,000 Uyghur fighters are in Syria, and more than 1,000 of them were killed during the war alongside opposition factions against the former Syrian regime.
It added that after supporting the armed group once led by the current Syrian transitional President, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the Uyghurs were rewarded with high-level appointments in the Syrian Ministry of Defense.
Officials in the Syrian Ministry of Defense and Uyghurs said a large number of former Turkistan Islamic Party fighters, the largest Uyghur fighting force, have been integrated into the newly reconstituted Syrian army.
Their integration in Syria
NPR quoted the Syrian Ministry of Defense as saying that Uyghurs in Syria “do not pose an internal or external threat, but rather are committed to what guarantees Syria’s security and stability.”
The ministry added that “their integration into the Syrian system serves the interest of protecting Syrian sovereignty and preventing unrest in their countries of origin,” according to the broadcaster.
According to the report, two issues cast a shadow over the continued presence of Uyghurs in Syria. Many Syrian Arabs oppose the continued presence of foreign fighters, including Uyghurs, in Syria.
Outside Idlib, most Syrians have never seen a Uyghur fighter before. The conservative Sunni beliefs held by many Uyghurs in Syria also raise concerns among the country’s minorities, according to the broadcaster.
Uyghur fighters also seized homes, many of them abandoned, during the years of war in neighborhoods with Shiite and Christian majorities.
The broadcaster quoted Denise Khoury, 75, while standing inside the Sacred Heart of Jesus Church in Latakia (western Syria), as saying she checked her mother’s home in northern Syria after the war and found it “occupied” by foreign fighters.
According to NPR, Uyghurs have begun returning some of the land and homes they had occupied in several Christian-majority villages, after months of negotiations between the new Syrian government, Uyghur officers, and Christian leaders.
A file concerning China
China is seeking to build new relations with Syria, but that relationship faces major challenges and obstacles, foremost among them the file of Uyghur fighters and Chinese concern over the presence of groups in Syria that pose a threat to its national security.
The Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates earlier denied handing Uyghur fighters over to China, responding to reports carried by Agence France-Presse from two Syrian sources that Syria intended to hand Uyghur fighters over to China.
The French agency reported that Syrian authorities would hand 400 Muslim Uyghur fighters over to China.
Who are the Uyghurs in Syria?
The East Turkestan Islamic Movement, also known as the Turkistan Islamic Movement, was founded in 1993 and has its main base in the Waziristan region of northern Pakistan. It is considered an extension of the state declared by Uyghurs in what is now the Xinjiang region in northwestern China.
The United States Department of the Treasury designated the East Turkestan Islamic Movement a “terrorist” organization in 2002, before lifting this designation in October 2020.
The group aims to establish an independent “East Turkestan” in China. Since its creation, it has forged close ties with the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.
It was founded by Hasan Mahsum, who came from China’s Xinjiang region and was killed by Pakistani soldiers in October 2003.
According to information verified by Enab Baladi in 2019, around 3,000 Uyghur fighters are fighting within the Turkistan Islamic Party, most of whom arrived with their families and are living in the western countryside of Idlib and the northern countryside of Latakia (northwestern Syria).
Uyghurs are subjected to repression and attempts to erase their cultural and religious identity by the Chinese government, which has detained about one million of them, according to Amnesty International.
The Chinese government refuses to recognize them as an indigenous people and sees them only as a regional minority within a multiethnic state.
Uyghurs speak a Karluk branch of the Turkic language, and this shared linguistic background with Turks has helped make Turkey a transit point for them on their way to Syrian territory.
[Source: Enab Baladi English]
