Global Intelligence Update
August 18, 1998
Chinese Flooding Provides Opportunity for Ethnic Separatist Action
The devastating floods in China have opened a window of opportunity for
Muslim Uighur separatists in China's western Xinjiang region.
Approximately one million soldiers, nearly one third of the People's
Liberation Army (PLA), have been mobilized to battle the flooded Yangtze
River. More than 100,000 additional soldiers are battling the Nenjiang
River, which threatens China's northeastern Daqing oil fields. Additional
Chinese security forces have been deployed in flood-ravaged regions to
contain social unrest among the displaced populations. With much of
China's military and political attention focused on the flooding, China's
Uighur separatists have taken the opportunity to strike at government
facilities in Xinjiang.
The Hong Kong-based Information Centre of Human Rights and Democratic
Movement in China issued a press release on August 15, reporting that
Uighur separatists had attacked targets in three cities on August 10. In
one incident, the separatists reportedly killed eight members of the Public
Security Bureau and the People's Armed Police in Kashgar, a major city near
the border with Kyrgyzstan. In a second incident on the same day,
separatists reportedly sprayed a police station at Kargilik, 300 kilometers
southeast of Kashgar, with machine-gun fire. In yet a third incident,
separatists stormed an arms depot in the Guma district, 100 kilometers from
Kargilik. It is unknown whether there were any casualties from the
Kargilik and Guma attacks.
Chinese officials have denied knowledge of the reported incidents, but
Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported that an official at the Public Security
Bureau headquarters in the Xinjiang capital of Urumqi had confirmed that
Kashgar was under martial law. Uighur separatists were blamed for two bomb
attacks on July 8 in the city of Khotan, during a visit to Xinjiang by
Chinese President Jiang Zemin. President Jiang was in the region to urge
local authorities to step up their campaign against the separatists.
According to the South China Morning Post, there were several additional
bombings during Jiang's visit, and police and military forces in the region
were in a high state of alert. Regional heads of public security agencies
met in Urumqi on August 3 to refocus their efforts on combating the
separatists.
Xinjiang, a predominantly Muslim Uighur region, with ethnic Han Chinese
making up only 37 percent of the population, has faced a growing separatist
movement since 1996. A wave of violent demonstrations in February 1997 was
followed by a government crackdown, in which thousands or tens of thousands
of separatists (depending on the report) were arrested. According to
security sources in Beijing, cited by the South China Morning Post,
Xinjiang's pro-independence movement has escalated into an armed struggle
due to "an influx of firearms into the western parts of the autonomous
region." The sources claimed that clashes involving "heavy firearms" have
taken place when authorities attempted to confiscate arms caches. Beijing
has sought the assistance of Central Asian republics in stemming this arms
traffic, but the Chinese government is worried that the Uighurs could find
a new source of arms in the Taleban militia of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Already facing economic difficulties and natural disasters, Beijing is also
becoming acutely aware of the growing separatist threat in Xinjiang.
China's official Press Digest reported on August 14 that three police had
died in "ferocious clashes" in April and June of this year, and that
Chinese should "learn from and salute the three heroes." The newspaper
claimed the three "martyrs" had sacrificed their lives to defend "stability
and prosperity in the western frontier of the motherland." In an effort to
combat the threat, the Chinese Communist Party has established a new
agency, the "Bureau for Maintenance of Social Stability," which has been
tasked with collecting information on separatist movements, as well as
underground political organizations, unemployed workers and peasants, and
recently discharged soldiers. The bureau will reportedly work closely with
the Ministry of State Security, the People's Armed Police, and elements of
the Communist Party Central Committee.
President Jiang's visit to Xinjiang, which followed a visit to Central Asia
in which he discussed anti-terrorism and anti-insurgency cooperation with
the region's leaders, clearly marked what was to have been a major new
campaign against the Uighur separatists. Further evidence of this can be
seen in Beijing's decision to go ahead with a publicity campaign extolling
Chinese to learn from the example of the police martyrs. The flooding has
opened a window of opportunity to the separatists by delaying that
campaign, and the delay may last for some time to come.
China will not be able to simple refocus attention in Xinjiang when the
floods recede. If anything, China is only beginning to deal with the
effects of the floods, which have already caused $24 billion in damages at
last estimate. The social unrest stemming from dislocation, unemployment,
and hunger resulting from the floods, compounded by China's already
weakening economy, will occupy a major portion of the PLA and security
forces throughout China for months. However, as the national crisis ebbs,
or at least evolves in such a way as to allow the PLA to turn their
attention once again to China's western frontier, the crackdown on
separatists should resume with vigor. It still remains to be seen whether
the exemplary tale of China's police martyrs in Xinjiang marks the
beginning of a campaign in that region alone, or a broader campaign
covering Tibet and dissidents throughout China.
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