Authorities forbid Communist Party cadres, civil officials and students from marking Ramadan in mainly Muslim province.
Chinese
authorities in the northwestern province of Xinjiang have banned Muslim
officials and students from fasting during the month of Ramadan,
prompting an exiled rights group to warn of new violence.
Guidance
posted on numerous government websites called on Communist Party
leaders to restrict Muslim religious activities during the holy month,
including fasting and visiting mosques.
Xinjiang
is home to about nine million Uighurs, largely a Muslim ethnic
minority, many of whom accuseChina’s leaders of religious and political
persecution.
The
region has been rocked by repeated outbreaks of ethnic violence,
but China denies claims of repression and relies on tens of thousands of
Uighur officials to help it govern the province.
A
statement from Zonglang township in Xinjiang’s Kashgar district said
that “the county committee has issued comprehensive policies on
maintaining social stability during the Ramadan period.
“It
is forbidden for Communist Party cadres, civil officials (including
those who have retired) and students to participate in Ramadan religious
activities.”
The
statement, posted on the Xinjiang government website, urged party
leaders to bring “gifts” of food to local village leaders to ensure that
they were eating during Ramadan.
Similar
orders on curbing Ramadan activities were posted on other local
government websites, with the educational bureau of Wensu county urging
schools to ensure that students do not enter mosques during Ramadan.
'Administrative methods’
During Ramadan, Muslims fast from dawn to dusk and strive to be more closer to God, pious and charitable.
An
exiled rights group, the World Uyghur Congress, warned the policy would
force “the Uighur people to resist [Chinese rule] even further.”
“By
banning fasting during Ramadan, China is using administrative methods
to force the Uighur people to eat in an effort to break the fasting,”
said group spokesman Dilshat Rexit in a statement. Xinjiang
saw its worst ethnic violence in recent times in July, 2009, when
Uighurs attacked members of the nation’s dominant Han ethnic group in
the city of Urumqi, sparking clashes in which 200 people from both sides
died, according to the government.
