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http://slash.autonomedia.org/the_new_war/01/12/28/0213223.shtml WHO'S SIDE IS CHINA ON? Conventional wisdom holds that China has closed ranks with the US-led anti-terrorist coalition because of the threat of Islamic insurgency in the northwest province of Xinjiang, which borders Afghanistan. A Dec. 16 New York Times account of the situation in the restive province began with the image of accused Uighur separatist Metrozi Mettohti, sentenced to death in a sports stadium in the city of Hokan, shouting "Long live Eastern Turkestan!" before he was gagged. At least 25 Uighurs have been executed this year, with scores more on death row. The number could be higher, as Chinese authorities have stopped publicizing executions. The Uighurs, a Turkic and Muslim people, have legitimate grievances against Beijing. The province is now officially the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, but administrative posts are held by Chinese Communist Party officials. Uighurs accounted for 90% of region's population in 1949, but now constitute under half--due to Chinese efforts to colonize the region with ethnic Han. Uighurs cite official efforts to discourage fasting this Ramadan, such as giving food stalls tax breaks to stay open, and making school kids go to the cafeteria instead of allowing them to go home at lunchtime. Muslim leaders are required to attend government seminars on official policy and history of the region as written by the Communist Party. A shirt-lived Eastern Turkestan Islamic Republic was declared in Kashgar in 1933. A decade later, a second such republic was proclaimed near Yili, and survived as an autonomous zone loyal to Chiang Kai-Shek's Kuomintang until the Communists took over in 1949. The separatist movement was revived when the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 raised hopes for an independent Uighurstan. Wahhabism and other Islamic revivalist sects entered from the newly-independent former Soviet states of Central Asia. Since then, separatist unrest and Chinese repression have fueled each other in a vicious cycle. A series of bombings and clashes with police culminated in riots in Yili in Feb. 1997. Scores were arrested after the riots, and several sentenced to death. One man who had translated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights into Uighur was sentenced to 20 years. China acknowledges 2,000 political prisoners (sentenced for "endangering state security"). The Sweden-based Eastern Turkestan Information Center says this does not include the increasing number sent to labor camps rather than prisons. (New York Times, Dec.16) But those bent on posing China as "America's new major enemy" won't quit. In his new book Seeds of Fire, author Gordon Thomas claims that Beijing had an actual role in the 9-11 attacks. Thomas writes that on Sept. 11, a transport plane from Beijing landed in Kabul, carrying a Chinese delegation to sign a deal with the Taliban--reportedly brokered by Osama bin Laden--to provide missile-tracking technology, state-of-the-art communications and air-defense systems. In return, the Taliban would order the Uighur separatists to stop their activities. The book draws from a Sept. 13 Washington Post story which said Beijing had just signed a deal with the Taliban to provide "much needed infrastructure and economic development assistance." Thomas claims the delegation included senior People's Liberation Army and Bureau of State Security officers, and managers from two top Chinese military contractors. He contends that hours after the plane landed in Kabul, CIA chief George Tenet received a coded "red alert" from Israeli Mossad agents presenting a "worst case scenario" that China would use a surrogate--bin Laden--to attack the United States. Thomas also claims that the former head of Pakistan's intelligence agency, Lt. Gen. Mahmoud Ahmad, was in Washington to meet with Tenet on Sept. 11, and that he briefed Tenet that day on the links between bin Laden and China. Ahmad allegedly "told [Tenet] that China had made a decisive decision." (One wonders if Gen. Ahmad always speaks in redundancies.) The author also cites what he calls "happy parties in the streets of Beijing" following the attacks. "They're selling videos there with commentary saying, 'America had it coming,'" said Thomas. "It's in China's interest to see the US destabilized." (Frontier Post, Peshawar, Dec. 16) In a similar vein were October reports on the relentlessly alarmist Israel-based DEBKA website (debka.com) that China had secretly sent a contingent of military troops to Afghanistan to fight alongside the Taliban against the US.S <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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