mr president for centuries the uighurs have eked out a perilous living in an inhospitable part of a vast country
most of them are peaceful followers of islam
however sadly some of the local population in recent years have become increasingly radicalised by terrorists in league with al-qaida
china has never been tolerant of dissent or its own minorities but i do share its concern about the threat of uighur islamist terrorism
i actually helped convince the council to ban the uighur east turkestan liberation front three years ago
china's authoritarianism and han dominance must not be used as an excuse by uighur terrorists some of whom are found as far afield as guantánamo bay to spread fear and violence as most victims of the recent violence were in fact han chinese
many of us are naturally concerned about human rights in china and i am also committed as a friend of taiwan
however the eu remains wedded to a one-china policy and given that the eu officially considers taiwan and tibet part of the people's republic of china we should certainly not support in any way the secession of xinjiang province
one interesting aspect of this issue is whether this controversy will cause china's muslim partners in africa like sudan to reassess their links to the country
finally i note that turkey's prime minister erdogan has labelled this violence as a genocide a bit rich coming from him when his own country fails to recognise the armenian genocide
his efforts to appeal to pan-turkic nationalism are also hypocritical given turkey's treatment of its own minorities and in particular the kurds in eastern turkey
