A Syrian Islamist group has declared war on China. The group is called Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP). It’s an ally of the the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist group that led the rebel offensive in Syria and toppled the regime of Bashar-al Assad.
On December 8, when HTS drove out Assad from Syria, the TIP dropped a bombshell on Beijing. They released a video, with a masked man saying, “Now here in Syria, in all the cities here, we fight for Allah, and we will continue to do this in our Urumchi, Aqsu and Kashgar in the future.”
The masked man added, “We have fought in Homs, in Idlib and we will continue the fight in East Turkistan.”
Let’s know more about the TIP first. The group is made up of Uyghur Muslims. This community originally hails from China’s Xinjiang province and has faced genocide in China at the hands of the communist regime. Over the past decade, China erased their culture, languages, mosques, schools, food and even historical texts. Beijing justified its crackdown saying it was required to fight extremism.
Uyghurs have been practising Islam for centuries, tracing their roots to the Karakhanid, a Turkic fiefdom that ruled Central Asia from the 9th to the 13th century. In previous centuries, Uyghurs followed other religions including Zoroastrianism and Buddhism. According to Chinese media, over 12 million Uyghurs live in Xinjiang today.
But they never wanted to be a part of China in the first place. In 1933, Uyghurs founded an independent East Turkestan in today’s Xinjiang but they were soon conquered by nationalist Chinese led by Chiang Kai-shek. Then, a second East Turkestan was founded in 1944, with support from the Soviets. But, they also surrendered to the Chinese regime just five years later. Since 1949, when Mao Zedong’s communist army took control of Xinjiang, out-migration has increased substantially, with Uyghurs leaving the region to escape political and religious repression.
That’s how many of these Uyghurs ended up in Syria. They have been living there for decades, with some of them joining the HTS. As per Syrian media, Uyghurs are one of the most loyal allies of the HTS.
Now, the question is: How will Uyghurs, sitting thousands of miles away from Xinjiang, fight the Chinese regime? The answer lies in Washington DC. It’s clear that the HTS got the support from the US as well Israel in its fight against Bashar-al Assad. The US here can help the TIP reorganise its factions in Afghanistan and Pakistan, nations that share land route with China’s Xinjiang region. It’s to be noted that the TIP was active in these two nations in the late 1990s.
The TIP can also target Chinese infrastructure overseas. Under its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has been building mega bridges, roads, power plants in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the West Asian region. China often deploys its own workforce to work on these projects, making them an easy target for these TIP fighters.
This is similar to what the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan has been doing to Chinese projects in Pakistan for over the last three years.
The recent developments in Syria also come as the Afghanistan-based Khorasan branch of the Islamic State accelerates recruitment in Central Asia, including among Uyghurs. This means that the IS- Khorasan branch can also create fresh troubles for Taliban as well as the Chinese regime.
It’s a perfect storm for Beijing. While it has averted a bloodshed at home even after brutally cracking down on Uyghur Muslims, it remains to be seen how successfully it navigates this emerging crisis in its neighbourhood.
