| Xinjiang - China's Palestine? |
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| Written by Mark O'Neill | |
| Thursday, 13 August 2009 | |
 Book sales skyrocket for the best piece of reportage on the Uighur crisis
"If China continues its policies in Xinjiang, it will bring closer and closer a racial war like that between Israel and the Palestinians, a war with no resolution and no end." This is the judgment of Chinese author and journalist Wang Lixiong, who has written the best piece of reportage on the disputed region -- "Your East Turkestan, My Western Region." The Taiwan Locus printing house first published it in October 2007 and has been rushing out copies to meet demand this year. Sales in the Chinese-speaking world have soared as people struggled to explain the dramatic events in Urumqi since the start of July. However, it hasn't been translated into English, and probably won't be, given the fact that the west and particularly Europe is transfixed with allegations of Han Chinese domination in Tibet and is largely ignorant of what is happening in Urumqi. According to the official media, at least 197 died and 1,720 were injured in ethnic riots on the afternoon and evening of July 5. A crowd of Uighurs, armed with swords and batons, went to the city's main square, reportedly to protest the killing of at least two Uighurs at a factory in Shaoguan, Guangdong Province in June. The security forces blocked the protest and opened fire, killing at least 12. The crowd then went on the rampage, attacking and killing unarmed Han Chinese civilians. In response to the violence, President Hu Jintao broke off a visit to the G20 in Rome to return home. The central government has sent 130,000 soldiers from all over the country into the major cities in Xinjiang, where they are likely to stay at least until October 1, the 60th anniversary of the Communist state. People who want to understand what has happened in the last month can do no better than turn to the book by Wang, an independent author who travelled throughout Xinjiang and interviewed people from all the races who live there. In January 1999, he was imprisoned there for six weeks for 'possession of state secrets'. During his captivity, he befriended a Uighur intellectual who, after his release, introduced him to sectors of Uighur society normally closed to Han Chinese. For Wang, the closest parallel is Palestine. In 1949, when the Communists took power, Han Chinese accounted for six per cent of the population of Xinjiang, against 75 per cent Uighur. By 2005, the Uighur percentage had fallen to 45.9 per cent and the Han percentage had reached 39.6 per cent. Between 1990 and 2000, the number of Han increased by 1.79 million and that of minority races 1.5 million. This increase is the result of government policy to secure control of China's largest region and a major source of oil, gas, minerals, coal, cotton and other natural resources, and to settle tens of thousands of surplus people. In the first three decades of Communist rule, the government ordered people to settle in Xinjiang, including demobilized soldiers, 'criminals, 'rightists' and other 'undesirable classes'. Since 1980, it has used economic incentives, especially the 'Go West' policy, which involves pumping billions of yuan into Xinjiang and provided many opportunities for work. "This Han immigration has led to daily confrontation between races, a fight for resources and markets, and makes confrontation a daily experience," Wang writes. "This could lead to the 'Palestinian-ization' of the conflict." The two communities live largely separate lives, except in the workplace; intermarriage is rare and strongly opposed Power rests in the hands of Han officials, especially in the government and security forces; the top positions open to Uighurs are administrative. Relations between Han and Uighur, above all the young, have deteriorated, especially since bomb attacks in the region by those demanding independence in 1997. They have made Uighur men suspect in the eyes of Han, in Xinjiang and the rest of China, where they are treated with fear and suspicion. "If you treat me like a thief, why should we share the same country?" Economic power in Xinjiang rests in the hands of the Han, who have better access to education, technology, capital and markets. Companies, especially private ones, prefer to hire Han, who are likely to be better educated, qualified and speak better Mandarin than do Uighurs. One of the main instruments of this 'colonisation' is the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corp, known as the Bing Tuan (army group), an organization of militarized settlers established in the 1950s. It now has 2.6 million members and controls an area of 75,000 square kilometers. Its founder was Wang Zhen, a senior general who later became Vice President. In the 1950s, he dealt savagely with Uighur separatists; for each PLA soldier they killed, he ordered the execution of five Uighur men in the village where the killing occurred. He is one of three Han leaders whom Uighurs call 'the butcher of Xinjiang'. The first was Sheng Shicai, a Nationalist-backed general who controlled the region from 1933-1944. The third is Wang Lequan, who has been Communist Party chief of the region and head of the Bing Tuan since 1994. Wang sees language and religious policy as important aspects of this colonization. Mosques are not allowed to operate Koranic schools, those under 18 are not allowed to enter a mosque and there is no religious teaching in school. Public officials are not allowed to worship nor wear a beard – even though Karl Marx and Lenin had them. Mandarin is the language of education, government and business. Mastery of Mandarin – not Uighur – is essential for a successful career in almost any field. So, while education in Uighur is available in many schools, thousands of Uighurs choose to send their children to Mandarin schools. Making matters worse is changes in the way Uighur was written. Originally written in the Arabic script, it was changed to Roman letters in 1962 and then switched back to Arabic in the 1980s. As a result, thousands of Uighurs who studied in the 1960s and 1970s are unable to read their own language. "Most of the Han who came to Xinjiang more than 20 years ago learnt Uighur, but not those who have come in the last 20 years. Nor do they wish to learn. Then there is an enormous amount of political study, especially since the visit of Jiang Zemin in 1998. Each time you must write notes and keep them. Worst off are village teachers – they earn little and must do so much political study. They have no days of rest." In Xinjiang, as in Palestine, it is impossible to see the end of the conflict. Comments
(19)
 written by Kung Fu Man , August 20, 2009
What are we all taking about. Learn from England. The opium pushers.
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Poor Irish. Look what they have done to Ireland. Carved out a piece of Ireland. Call it Northern Ireland and dump the Protestants there to outnumber the Irish Catholics. When the Irish Catholics speak out against the discrimination label them terrorists - IRA! report abuse
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some of the comment-posts i report as missing in my post 'censorship' (immediately below) are now back -- with the notable exception of 'Terrible Comparison' by commentor Hmm Yeah, to whose ideas i object in 'Hardly Terrible' (2nd below).
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what pull ms.Yeah must have with the Sentinel staff (Ms Yeah has no pull with the staff. The person who regularly edits letters is away and the fumble-fingered editor (me) who is seeking to wipe out all the handbag and perfume sellers inadvertently wiped out the comments,then attempted to restore them. We missed one and would restore it if we cold find it. Our apologies. Comment away: Ed) report abuse
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Ms.Yeah (‘Terrible comparison’, Aug 17) , finds Mr.oNeill (or the Sentinel editor)’s title 'sensationalist’, which is true (not to say provocative), and his article (or journalist Wang’s best-seller) ‘terrible’, which is not true, for Wang’s comparison holds water. If anything, it holds much more than either article or book makes it do, as I shall show in posts titled ‘Tales of Origin’, 'Modern Parallels’ and ‘Confrontation’ (below, following commentor MoveMountain's latest charm offensive). But first : Yeah disses Wang because ‘Palestine and Israel are separate countries’ – meaning (presumably) that Israel conquered and occupies a separate sovereign state, whereas China didn’t and doesn’t. However Palestine is not a state but a land. This land is completely controlled by Israel, through two administrative regimes : 1. western-style civil society, established by insurrection west of the UN ‘Green Line’ 60 years ago; 2. martial law, established by war east of the ‘Green Line’ (to the Jordan) in the Summer of Love. You may argue that the distinction does not apply here, since the People’s Republic allows no civil society. But one is –depending on where one goes in China—either very aware of the military/paramilitary nature of state control or barely aware of it : in ‘China Proper’ (the Ming lands) these days one is usually barely aware, but in Xinjiang one cannot ignore it. Yeah says ‘Uighurs are Chinese‘ – meaning (presumably) that they enjoy a citizenship as full as any other the PRC offers, and therefore the ‘Palestinians’, belonging to a ‘separate country’ from Israel, cannot be analogous. Except for her mistaken idea that the Palestinians have their own country, I agree : they lack the rights afforded to a common Israeli (or to a ‘Palestinian’ Arab living in the civil society administrative zone), and this discrimination, this imbalance of rights according to region or ‘race’, does not exist on Chinese paper. But how many more rights an Israeli citizen has than a PRC one -- the right to freely assemble, to publish, to dissent. To take a recent example for comparison, if West Bank labourers were killed in an Israeli factory, would Israel investigate ? Would there be punishment ? We would think so. If the investigators were seen to be dragging their feet or white-washing, would there be a demonstration of solidarity with the murdered workers ? Under civil society, yes (if open media discussion of the event had not already brought results), and it would probably be peaceful. But in the Occupied zone such a demo would likely be met with force. Would these hypothetical frustrated West Bank demonstrators then go on a rampage ? Not unimaginable. But could they get down the road, much less their hands on the settlers in their gated communities ? Not bloody likely. Yeah says ‘the Israeli siege, both economical and military, has left [Gaza, one of the Occupied zones] in shambles. [The Israeli military] blocks any type of humanitarian efforts into the region’. Quite true, and a criminal situation which would be promptly stopped by the UN were it not for the Occupation's enduring USA support. Over against which ‘China has invested billions in Xinjiang’ - also true. But Israel Proper has invested billions in the Occupied zones, especially in the much larger West Bank. The problem is that the disenfranchised natives do not see much of it. One cannot say that just because such-and-such an amount of money goes into Region X, therefore the natives of X must be content. report abuse
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written by Movemountain , August 18, 2009
This might just be another naughty attempt by some Pentagon/CIA strategists/planners/schemers, but being innocently ( or really?) picked up by an old China-hand like O'neill, to delibarately portray China as a 'bad guy' ( sinistically as evil as the Zionists) in the face of Muslims worldwide. Need we reiterate exhaustively that a by-&-large atheist/Buddhist-Taoist Han Chinese & Islamists do not share a tormented antagonistic history quite unlike that between the Crusader-European conquerors & their Muslim Arab victims. In fact, on the contrary, it is the Malay Muslims in both Malaysia & Indonesia who have their hands soaked in their Chinese minorities' blood through their constant barbaric/horrific pogroms (abetted & proactively encouraged by their respectively Malay-racist govts) even as recently as 1998.
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Anyway, how on earth can a so-called experienced/knowlegeable old China-hand stoop so low (in human intelligence that is) to insinuate that there are similar parallels between the pathetically tragic Palestinian dilemma as against the Uighurs' alleged sufferings unless, of course, this exercise is purely & blatantly politically motivated. Let us scrutinise how this so-called Palestinian dilemma comes about in both its historical & present-day dimensions. The Jews are skillful & some would say, extremely mean merchants/traders of the 'Merchant of Venice' notoriety. They have been dispersed through ancient time into many pockets of settlements in various parts of Europe where they are hated/persecuted due to their dilligence & unscrupulously merchantilistic practices. It finally culminated in the Hollocaust by the Nazis (the rest of Europe conveniently forget to mention their very own ill-treatment of their Jewish populations within their borders). Meanwhile, during their hurried retreat from their colonial stolen lands in the MiddleEast, these mother-of-all-evil white British colonialists, suffering from their guilts upon their persecuted resident Jews in Europe & tired of being persistently harrased by the Zionist terrorists on Palestine, found it an expedient convenience to trade other people's lands (Arab lands) to pacify the Zionists (that is why these whites have no moral high ground to preach about Human Rights, benevolence & all these other craps) by conceding to a Jewish homeland called Israel, carved out right in the middle of ancient Arabic Palestine, without consulting & seeking the approval of the existing, centuries old local Palestinian inhabitants. Fastforward to the later part of the 20th century & right up to todate, these decendants of these despotic white colonialists, while lecturing other people about fair-play, good governance, human rights, democracy, rule of law & all these other craps, still persist in perpetuating the continuous sufferings of the Palestinians through their unwavering supports to this evil state of Israel in the form of diplomatic support in the UN & arming the Zionists to the teeth in order to deter any Arab reprisals. The rest is still tragically unfolding before our eyes like the War in Gaza & what's next? Now, do the Uighurs share any semblance to the Palestinians' pathetic fate? Xinjiang is an integral part of China. Uighurs may have come from other places in history, but they are firmly considered Chinese citizens whether they like it or not. They are never transplanted from places outside of China & of couse, China, unlike the weaker Arab States, will never allow outsiders to interfere in its internal affairs. If you (US, Europe, Japan, India & other enemies of China) dare to poke your unwanted fingers around, we shall have them chopped off in no time! Just try it if you wish. report abuse
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As commentor Samson points out ( 'Fanciful His-story', Aug 17), both nation-states in Wang's comparison are in the habit of claiming, by dint of some very dusty paperwork, the ‘right’ to the territories they occupy, a right arching high over the current natives and back to ancient days. The core tales of the Torah (or ‘Pentateuch’  –the multi-generational sentence in lower Nile labour-camps, the Exodus across the route of the future Suez canal, the Holy war of extermination against the natives of that time-- have all been archaeologically disproven. First Jewish settlement in the hump of land between the Med and the Jordan is evidenced at 1200 BCE, which falls coincidentally in the reign of the first historically verifiable ‘emperor’ in the Yellow River culture (Wu Ding, 22nd ruler of the Shang Dynasty). That emperor may have believed himself to be best represented by a dragon but his subjects did not yet claim reptilian patrilineality. He may have believed the fairy tale of Yu the Great Hydraulicist - but then he would also have known his own House to be usurpant of Yu’s descendants. With the Babylonian Exile of the Jewish cultural elite (5thCentury BCE) the tales stand on firmer historical ground. Their Iranian liberator Cyrus is well-attested. Note that internally exiling an entire class was common-enough imperialism : the Han Dynasty, setting about the annexation of Fujian (2ndC BCE), removed the elite of the Min-yue kingdom to encampment in Anhui. The Jewish Kingdom was ended for good by the occupant Romans, who erected on the rubble of Jerusalem a new provincial capital closed to Jews. Moving in from the opposite end of Asia, the Han Dynasty established the ‘Xiyu du hufu’, a protectorate over the Indo-European natives of the what we now call Xinjiang (against the Xiongnu AKA Huns). The Han presence though was short-lived and the collapse of the Xiyu protectorate may be seen as heralding that of the dynasty. Hereafter the two histories diverge : while the Jews did not reclaim their kingdom for 1800 years, the Yellow river culture was back as soon as imperial stability permitted. The Tang version of the protectorate, called ‘Anxi du hufu’, was ended by invading (Muslim) Uighurs, allied with (formerly Bon, newly Buddhist) Tibetans; both peoples in turn were to accept Mongol protection – a happiness which was to befall the Song Dynasty too and even its southern rump. The idea that Xinjiang was “Chinese” under the Mongols is self-evident balderdash; the region, like the Han lands themselves (‘China Proper’ , like Tibet and northern India and Iran, was then Mongolian if it was anyone’s. Otherwise mustnt we claim the Iranians, whose ‘blue & white’ ceramics first came to Han cultural consciousness during this period of TransAsian unity, also to be actually ‘Chinese’ ! The Ming Dynasty (running independent, Mongol-free Han-lands, and no fools) effected no revival of the Tang protectorate. When the Han-lands again gave way to a huge Asian empire –that of the Manchurians, who were recreating much of the Mongolian one-- then Han conscripts may supposably have numbered among the Qing troops who committed genocide in Dzungaria (northern Xinjiang), but let us hope they did not. An imperial program of 'state farms' then brought Han (im)migrants to the region – rising to 150 000 by 1830-- but forty years after this point the Manchurian Dynasty could no longer spare the military resources essential to their upkeep and the state farmers suffered expulsion. report abuse
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Not all Jews feel that the State of Israel has been a good eventuation for Judaism. Of those who do accept the State, most are happy that Jews at last have a ‘homeland’, though many Jews (including Israeli citizens) feel that it has done and is doing bad things under bad leaders. Some of the most prominent progressives and activists (within and without Israel) are Jews. Not all Han Chinese feel that the People’s Republic has been a good eventuation for Chinese culture. Of those who do accept the State, most are happy that ‘China’ has at last stood up, though many Chinese (including PRC citizens) feel that it has done and is doing bad things under bad leaders. Some of the most prominent progressives and activists are Chinese – but those who live within the PRC stand a markedly greater chance of suffering decades of imprisonment for ‘leaking state secrets’, etc. than those who live without it. Zionism was set rolling by Theodor Herzl (1860 -1904). He got the UK to offer its colony of Uganda up to the tender mercies of the kibbutzniks, but finally couldn’t win the Zionist Congress over to an African adventure. Modern Chinese power was returned to Xinjiang by Zuo Zongtang (1812-1885, known in the West as ‘General Tso’ and –in Canada and other parts of North America-- by his Hunan Fried Chicken). Zuo it was who in the 1870s forced the Czar to back down the Ili valley (and who then had to watch as many XJ Hui then promptly decamped downhill, preferring the Czar’s protection ). In League-of-Nations-mandated Palestine, the UK apparatchiks watched the Jewish minority double, accounting toward the end of the anti-German war for fully one third of all Palestinian residents. Wang/oNeill mentions the Han chauvinist Sheng Shicai, who as Xinjiang warlord from 1933 to 1944 tortured and killed his many Uighur and Kazakh prisoners, with the support of his Soviet puppet-masters. Toward the end of the Jiang Kaishek’s long anti-Japanese war, Sheng came to terms, and turned on the Soviets, putting the head of Mao’s brother Zemin on a stake. In the diplomatic eyes of Mao’s ‘New China’ there was no Israeli State – only ‘Occupied Palestine’. This was quite in line with China’s friendly face toward the so-called Third World (Latin America, Africa, the ‘Arab world’, etc.). Nonetheless China took seriously Israeli pioneer experience in 'liberating’ Muslim-populated, so-called desert areas for intensive agriculture (as it took seriously USAmerican ‘cowboy’ experience in subduing the natives bequeathed it by westward expansion -- and as the USA now takes seriously Israeli ‘  efence force’ experience in close, Muslim quarters); the citizen-soldiers Kibbutzniks were a model for the conscripts of the Xinjiang Prioduction and Construction Corps or ‘Bing Tuan’. Wang Zhen’s rule-of-thumb for collective punishment over against insurgents (oNeill’s 11th paragraph, above) does remind of the richly-deserved 1942 death of Heydrich, and of his Occupying Power’s retaliation for the which upon the villages of Lidice & Lezaky -- the sort of viciousness now proscribed by the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949). Mao s move to a Cold-war partnership with the USA could not but lead to an eventual PRC recognition of the State of Israel (not three years after Jiang Zemin succeeded Mao as CPC head, and just months before Zemin succeeded Liu Shaoqi as PRC ‘President’ . This move has entailed some co-ordination (or stream-lining) of world-view : USA/Israel faces indigenous Muslim resistance; China/Bing-Tuan faces indigenous Muslim resistance. The USA in turn agrees that some of China’s indigenous resistors are ‘Terrorists’ (especially when it needs PRC support for its historically unprecedented move into Central Asia). Of course the USA doesn’t quite as readily as Beijing brand all resistance as Terrible; as witness the Uighur prisoners now freed from Guanta’namo and moved –despite a heavily insistent Chinese welcome-- to the islands of Bermuda and Palau. report abuse
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written by abd al-ghazali , August 17, 2009
It must comfort the Chinese to constantly think that their problems stem from "outside" sources instead of looking at their own failings. Does it help you guys sleep at night? Pretending that all your ethnic issues stem from one mysterious, monolithic foreign entity that apparently controls public opinion all over the world? I wonder if the Chinese realize how closely their current brand of nationalism resembles that of Japan's imperial days.
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Han migrants to the Autonomous Region since the Deng 1980s are, Wang/oNeill says, uninterested in learning the Uighur tongue : it is not germane to their perceived self- advancement. They have about as much interest in local culture, in other words, as a cheap-flight Briton pub-crawling on Ibiza or Cyprus. They are not economic migrants - they are economic tourists. What proportion of Israelis can speak Arabic? What proportion of Palestinians (whether residing under civil or military administration) find it judicious to master a little Hebrew ? Intermarriage (Han + Uighur), Wang/oNeill says, is frowned upon. I know of no legal constraints on such unions regarding the Arab minority lucky enough to share in Israel’s ‘civil society’, but non-resident labour may be another story. Imported labour from Pingtan County in Fuzhou, FJ, for example, must contract that they will not so much as engage in sexual intercourse while in Israel, such is the fear of miscegenation and wrong immigration. It is common now (on the left, anyway) to compare Israel’s West Bank checkpoint system to the racist Bantustan residence-ID system in old (pre-ANC) South Africa. It is less common to compare either of these to the CPC’s ‘hukou’ system, which effectively makes a second-class citizen of any migrant labourer – yet the comparison is not unheard. The Bing Tuan state farm cities (Shihezi, Kuitun, etc) are in effect ‘No Go’ zones for the Uighur, especially one seeking meaningful employment. ‘The top positions open to Uighurs are administrative’ says Wang/oNeill. CPC practice has been to hand-pick a groomed ethnic to fill certain high profile chairs (eg Nur Bekri, governor of Xinjiang AR; Qiangba Puncog, governor of Tibet AR last year) while keeping real power in the back room (Bing Tuan head Wang Lequan, CPC secretary of Xinjiang AR; Youth League head Hu Jintao, CPC secretary of Tibet AR 1988-89). Lastly, perhaps the main reason Wang fears similarity to Occupied Palestine is the spectre of ‘racial war’ – a situation none can resolve, and whose end is ‘impossible to see’. Anyone familiar with the thinking of the Israeli hard right, though, knows of at least one final scenario : that where every last Arab has been sent packing from Palestine. report abuse
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Like China, Israel can use history to "justify" it's occupation of Palestine.
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Long ago, Palestine belonged to the biblical Land of Israel. report abuse
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written by Ip man , August 14, 2009
China must learn from Turkey.
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Check out how the Turks slaughtered the Greek Cypriots, the Kurds, the Armenians, etc. Now we all know they are deliberately kept out of the EU. report abuse
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written by Nur Bakri , August 14, 2009
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Jump to: navigation, search 50 Cent Party (五毛党, pinyin: wǔmáodǎng), also called 50 Cent Army, is the name for paid[1] astroturfing bloggers operating since 2005 from People's Republic of China, whose role is posting comments favorable towards the government policies to skew the public opinion on various Internet message boards. They are named by the 50 Chinese cents, or 5 mao, they are paid per such post, though many operatives are volunteers; other names are red vests, red vanguard and the Five Mao Party.[2][3] Conservative estimates[who?] say the 50 Cents Army employs tens of thousands of bloggers, some estimates say as many as 280,000–300,000.[4][5] Their activities were described by Chinese President Hu Jintao as "a new pattern of public-opinion guidance".[6] They operate primarily in Chinese, but English language posts appear as well. Their effect is most felt at the domestic Chinese-language websites, bulletin board systems, and chatrooms. Their role is to steer the discussion away from anti-party articulations, politically sensitive or "unacceptable" content[7] and advance the party line of the Communist Party of China.[8] It has been argued that it is not so much censorship but a public relations tactic.[9] According to the Indian Daily News and Analysis, "to this day, anyone who posts a blatantly propagandist pro-Communist Party message online is dismissed by increasingly cynical Chinese Netizens as belonging to the Wu Mao Dang (50 Cents Party report abuse
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written by Ronaldo , August 14, 2009
The whites cam to America to rob the land from the American natives. Originally America was 100% native Americans, now they are down to maybe 0.5%, and the whites and blacks and hispanics form nearly 95%, and the rest are asians. Native American languages and culture are close to extinction. And they are totally marginalised. The whites also invaded Hawaii and the native Hawaiians are a small minority now. The Europeans also invaded South America and now totally control South America. So please don't go about preaching to China about XinJiang and Tibet. These two provinces were part of China long before the Europeans knew how to build a ship to invade the other parts of the world, and introducing mass slavery on the Africans and South American natives.
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written by Ronaldo , August 14, 2009
There is NO East Turkestan to start with. XinJiang had been part of China for many many centuries. The Turks came to settle in XinJiang. They did not even take the trouble to learn the language of their host country. They start causing trouble. In the latest riots, these Turks were the ones that went around with weapons to kill innocent civilians. Yet the western media blame the Chinese for the genocide. It is the Turks that should be charged with genocide. If the Turks still look to Turkey as their master, then they should not stay in China. If they want to stay in China, they should pledge their allegiance to China, and try to integrate and assimilate with the rest of the Chinese people. They should take the trouble to learn the Chinese language, and not cling on to Turkey, the country of thei great great great grandfathers. Can you blame the Chinese people for being suspicious of them if they go about brandishing Turkish flags, and demanding an independent Turkish state?
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written by Jiha , August 13, 2009
"In 1949, when the Communists took power, Han Chinese accounted for six per cent of the population of Xinjiang, against 75 per cent Uighur.
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By 2005, the Uighur percentage had fallen to 45.9 per cent and the Han percentage had reached 39.6 per cent. Between 1990 and 2000, the number of Han increased by 1.79 million and that of minority races 1.5 million." report abuse
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Learning from Americans, Lowly rated comment [Show]
Dynas Tee, which 'Taiwanese separatists' are you on about -- the Locus Printing house ? (2nd paragraph in article)
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And who exactly is the 'evil foreigner' ? Don't tell me we 're in for another personal attack on reporter oNeill ! How much does the Party pay you to write this s**t ? (If they paid more, they might obtain the services of a little red net boy who can actually read english.) There is no separatism in this article --nor in Wang Lixiong's book-- except in the hearts and minds of SOME of the people who are interviewed and reported. If you want to enjoy total control over what is published, go to a mainland newsagent and leave real newspapers alone. report abuse
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Separatist s**ts, Lowly rated comment [Show]
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Can Ms Long have forgotten Mordechai Vanunu, the nuclear technician tracked down and EXTRAORDINARILY RENDERED from Italy by the Mossad in 1986, for trial & conviction of TREASON AND ESPIONAGE for talking to UK reporters!
Vanunu, 32 yrs old at time of these extraordinaries, remained in Israeli detention until 2004. Eleven of those years were passed SOLITARILY. Released without his civil rights, he has been redetained several times for making like he did have rights, the right to leave Israel being one example.
In 2007 Vanunu was sentenced to another six months in prison. Amnesty International said it considered him A PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE and called for HIS IMMEDIATE AND UNCONDITIONAL RELEASE.** Daniel Ellsberg, no slouch, refers to Vanunu as THE PREEMINENT HERO OF THE NUCLEAR ERA.***
T Long may be trumpeting an illusory demarcation between zones of civil and martial law.
* [3] MODERN PARALLELS, August 17
** PRESS RELEASE, 2007 July 02
*** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanunu