Turkish FM Asks China to Let Uyghurs ‘Live Their Values,’ Fails to Condemn Genocide

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan concluded a visit to occupied East Turkistan on Thursday, declaring the region “Turk-Islamic” but failing to condemn the colonial Chinese government for its ongoing genocide of the indigenous Uyghur people of the region.

Fidan is the first Turkish official to visit East Turkistan – a former sovereign republic before mass murderer Mao Zedong occupied it for communist China in 1949 – since 2012, the year before current dictator Xi Jinping took power in China. Xi dramatically escalated already existing state persecution of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other people in East Turkistan in 2017, building a sprawling system of concentration camps and imposing a policy of “breaking lineages, breaking roots, breaking connections, breaking origins” to exterminate the local culture.

Islamist Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was once a vocal supporter of the Uyghur cause, accusing China of “genocide” against them as early as 2009. Following Turkey’s introduction into China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2015, however, and a massive growth in bilateral trade, Erdogan silenced his criticism and has enacted policies to suppress the Uyghur minority in his own country,

Uyghurs in Istanbul and Washington, DC, protested Fidan’s visit to China this week, calling it a “betrayal” of a brethren people and an endorsement of genocide.

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The Turkish state news network, Anadolu Agency, reported that Fidan discussed, among other issues, “the situation of Uyghur Turks” in conversations with Chinese officials in both Beijing and East Turkistan, which the Communist Party refers to by the colonial Han name “Xinjiang.”

“Fidan’s discussions on the situation regarding Uyghur Turks revealed Türkiye’s views on this matter to the Chinese authorities in Beijing and Xinjiang with sincerity and clarity,” Anadolu claimed.

The agency reported that Fidan told his Chinese hosts that Turkey hopes to see Uyghurs “live in prosperity and peace as well as all other communities in China” and noted the “sensitivities of the Turkish and Islamic world regarding the protection of the cultural rights of Uyghur Turks and the preservation of their values were well known to everyone.” Other outlets translated Fidan’s remarks as urging China to allow Uyghurs to “live their values” without repression, citing Turkish government officials.

KASHGAR, CHINA – JUNE 28: An ethnic Uyghur man holds his grandson as he sits outside his house in an area waiting development by authorities in the old town of Kashgar, in the far western Xinjiang province, China (Kevin Frayer/Getty Images).

Fidan reportedly emphasized that the East Turkistan cities he visited, Kashgar and the ancient Uyghur city Urumqi, were “Turk-Islamic” cities, not Chinese.

“These two cities are ancient Turkic and Islamic cities that have contributed significantly to China’s cultural heritage,” Fidan said, according to a translation by Radio Free Asia (RFA). “They serve as a bridge between China and the Turkic and Islamic worlds, symbolizing our historical friendship and neighborliness.”

That declaration, while a plain statement of fact, is notable because Xi’s regime has endeavored to deny the Turkic heritage of East Turkistan. In 2019, for example, the Chinese Communist Party published a “white paper” claiming that Uyghurs were ethnically Chinese, akin to the majority Han people of China, and not Turkic.

“According to the white paper released by the [Communist Party] State Council Information Office in March, ‘the Uyghur ethnic group came into being in the long process of migration and ethnic integration; they are not descendants of the Turks,’” Chinese propaganda newspaper Global Times declared that year.

“The Uyghur people are members of the Chinese family, not descendants of the Turks, let alone anything to do with Turkish people,” then-Mayor of Urumqi Yasheng Sidike was quoted as saying.

Fidan published photos of his visit to East Turkistan on social media on Wednesday, celebrating that he had been able to visit Urumqi and Kashgar and expressing a longtime desire to do so.

“For many years, I have had the opportunity to visit many historical cities that contributed to the establishment of the Turkish-Islamic civilization,” the foreign minister wrote on Twitter. “Urumqi and Kashgar always remained in my heart as a regret. Finally, thanks to my contacts in China, I visited these two ancient cities”:

While defying the Chinese Communist Party narrative that no Turks live in East Turkistan, no reports on Fidan’s visit indicated that he addressed the Uyghur genocide or, outside of his mild comment urging China to let Uyghurs “live their values,” pressured China to respect the human rights of the indigenous people of the region.

On the contrary, Chinese outlets claimed that Fidan was open to expanding “security” cooperation with China and that he insisted any affinity to the Uyghurs would not undermine China’s ethnic cleansing agenda.

According to the regime-approved Xinjiang Daily, Fidan told his Chinese hosts that “he had observed well-developed urban facilities, social prosperity and a good protection of various ethnic cultures and languages during his visit to Xinjiang,” according to the South China Morning Post.

“The Turkish foreign minister also said Turkey did not allow activities within its borders that endangered China’s security and territorial integrity,” the newspaper added – an indication that Turkey would silence Uyghurs protesting the genocide inside Turkey. Turkey is home to one of the world’s largest Uyghur diaspora communities.

Uyghur protesters this week condemned Fidan’s visit as an endorsement of the abuses their people are currently enduring.

“Oppression and massacres are taking place in East Turkestan, Uyghur men are being sent to the concentration camps, and their wives are being forced to live with Han Chinese,” Kok Bore, head of the Turkey-based Blue Turk Bodun Association, told RFA at the Istanbul protest. “How long shall we be silent?”

In Washington, members of the East Turkistan Government in Exile condemned the Turkish government as “backstabbers.”

“The recent visit of Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan to China and then to occupied East Turkistan and his alliance with the genocidal Chinese occupation regime is more than a simple diplomatic affair, it is an outright endorsement of China’s genocidal policies,” Salih Hudayar, the foreign minister of the government in exile, said, “a campaign of colonization, occupation, against the Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Tatar, and other Turkic people of occupied East Turkistan.”

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