Thread by @WilliamYang120

In @UyghurProject new report by @Rachel_A_Harris and @AzizIsaElkun, they found that #China's crackdown of #Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities, which includes systemic destruction of cultural heritage, constitutes "strategic cultural cleansing." My latest:dw.com/zh/%E5%A0%B1%E…

The report characterizes #Beijing's persecution of #Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities as : "the deliberate targeting of individuals and groups based on their cultural, ethnic or religious affiliation, ...

... combined with the intentional and systematic destruction of their cultural heritage."

“As acknowledged by the International Criminal Court, acts of dispossession and destruction of cultural heritage are often the precursor to acts of genocide. Attacks on cultural heritage, from sacred architecture to community practices and customs, ...

... are inseparable from direct physical attacks on human beings. They are a form of cultural warfare aimed at the elimination of a people and their identity," said Dr. Harris.

The report focuses on five cultural heritage in #Xinjiang on @UNESCO's list: the Uyghur Muqam of Xinjiang, Manas, Meshrep, Tengritagh (Tianshan), and Karez.

According to Dr. Harris, "when heritage is used in tandem with the hard modes of governance currently in play in the Uyghur region—one that states and international bodies have designated a form of genocide—then the heritage system itself is complicit in those acts of genocide."

The report shows that China’s management of the cultural heritage of the Uyghur region places control firmly in the hands of the government and its chosen commercial partners.

"Heritage is exploited for economic profit and used to promote the government’s chosen versions of history and culture, regardless of established historical fact and regardless of the rights of communities and culture bearers acknowledged in UNESCO’s conventions," said the report

One of the cultural heritage featured in the report is Uyghur Muqam of Xinjiang, which is a musical repertoire, widely regarded as the classical music of the Uyghurs that's proclaimed by UNESCO as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity in 2005.

It's inscribed on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2008.

But since 2017, several well-known professional Muqam performers employed in government-supported troupes have been arbitrarily detained, along with unknown numbers of Sufi followers who performed Muqam in religious contexts.

The report also found that regional authorities have closed institutions previously tasked with researching the tradition, and introduced radical changes to the teaching and performance of the Muqam ...

... in order to align with Xi Jinping’s policy of promoting a “pluralistic-unified” Chinese nation.

An interviewee told the authors that: "Many of the dance and music students from the Arts Institute were sent to the camps. ... We can say that around 30 to 40 percent of the employees of the Xinjiang Arts Center were detained and sent to the camps."

Those released have subsequently appeared in public giving performances which directly promote government ethnic policies. Prominent Muqam performers have been featured on Xinjiang TV performing songs praising Xi Jinping.

According to the authors, the large numbers of short detentions of professional singers relate to government perceptions of the significant role played by music in promoting Uyghur identity.

Additionally, evidence from the report shows that teaching materials used to teach Muqam have been banned and destroyed, alongside other documented instances of book burning, bans on Uyghur history textbooks, and death sentences handed to their authors.

"A textbook used in the Muqam program at the Arts Institute, originally published with support from the Regional Education Bureau, was banned and copies were burned during the major cleansing of Uyghur language materials that took place in Spring 2018," the report said.

"What we see across all of these five items that we are looking at on the UNESCO list is the pattern of culture bearers being arrested or disappeared and the culture being taken out of their hands," Dr. Harris told me.

Another cultural heritage featured in the report is Meshrep, an umbrella term for Uyghur community gatherings that typically include food, music, joking and storytelling, and an informal community court.

According to the authors, before and after the cultural heritage was nominated to @UNESCO, grassroots community Meshrep gatherings have been designated by the Chinese authorities as criminal activities, Meshrep leaders and participants have been arbitrarily detained, ...

... and Uyghur communities which formerly nurtured Meshrep have been uprooted. "In their place, staged Meshrep shows have been used as tourist entertainment and for cultural diplomacy," wrote the authors.

The report points out that even though when China submitted its nomination file for Meshrep to UNESCO in 2009, the July 5 incident in Ürümchi took place, UNESCO still approved the submission in 2010.

"Following its inscription, the regional government took extreme measures to control the practice of Meshrep. Tahir Imin provided details on these controls, and on the use of staged Meshrep performances for commercial and political ends," wrote the authors.

"Only the county administration has the power to get permission to organize a Meshrep. First, they have to submit a request to the prefectural government, then to the Autonomous Regional Government," they wrote...

... adding that it means that organizing a Meshrep is a very serious political event and there is no possibility that ordinary people can organize Meshrep by themselves.

Dr. Harris told me that Meshrep is really important for strengthening communities, allowing communities to come together, transmit their culture, and make themselves strong.

"In 2017 when we saw these mass-arrests and the outright banning of all meshreps at the grassroots level. Instead of that, what we saw is the government putting Meshrep on stage for the outside world to see," she said.

"Meshrep has transformed from being a grassroots community practice to a practice completely in the hands of the government and be set on stage for the outside world to say how great it is that China is looking after its heritage.

What China is actually doing is disposessing the owners."

In conclusion, @Rachel_A_Harris and @AzizIsaElkun wrote that "in China, heritage is used as a soft tool of governance to control and manage history, and to steer people’s memories, sense of place, and identities in particular ways."

"China’s approach to heritage in the Uyghur region takes the heritage out of the hands of its rightful owners, by expelling communities from their ancestral lands and polluting the environment, ...

... by destroying built heritage and de-sacralizing religious traditions, and by criminalizing grassroots cultural practices, while using their staged representations to promote new political narratives."

They urged the Special Rapporteur on Cultural Rights and the High Commissioner for Human Rights should advocate for a stronger and more effective UNESCO response to abuses in the Uyghur region, ...

... including addressing letters to the UNESCO Director-General and to the chairpersons of the respective Committees."

Additionally, they think state parties to the ICH Convention should bring the information provided in this report to the attention of the ICH Committee at its 18th Session in Botswana (December 2023) ...

... and request that the Committee address a specific request to China for additional information on its implementation of the Convention in the XUAR and on the status of Muqam, Meshrep, and Manas, ...

... with particular attention to the widest possible participation of the Uyghur, Kyrgyz and Kazakh communities in the practice and safeguarding of their respective heritage.

Link to the full report: uhrp.org/report/the-com…