By Shannon Tiezzi
With the G20 leaders focused on terrorism after the attacks in Paris, China wants help in its fight against ETIM.
Chinese President Xi Jinping was in Antalya, Turkey November 15 and 16 for the G20 summit, a meeting of the world’s major economies. This year, the usual economic focus of the summit was derailed by the terrorist attacks in Paris on November 13, which suddenly placed the fight against terrorism at the top of the agenda. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, writing for Project Syndicate just after the Paris attacks, said that “terror will now vault to the top of the long list of pressing issues that will be discussed” at the G20 summit.
For China, terrorism domestically is tantamount to one group: the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), which seeks to create a separate country (East Turkestan) out of Xinjiang province. Though details on the group are hazy, China blamed separatists for the spate of terrorist attacks that rocked the country in late 2013 and 2014: a deadly, intentional car crash into Tiananmen Square in Beijing, a bloody attack by knife-wielding assailants at the Kunming railway station, and two separate bomb attacks at the Urumqi railway station and a popular market in Urumqi. Though Chinese officials and media are careful not to make the link explicitly, Xinjiang separatists are usually members of the Uyghur ethnic minority group.
Given the ethnic dimension, some outside observers remain unconvinced that ETIM exists as a coherent organization and have accused China of using ETIM as a front for violating Uyghur rights. Alim Seytoff, president of the Uyghur American Association, told The Diplomat in 2013 that China labels “every instance of alleged violence involving Uyghurs the work of ETIM in order to justify its brutal suppression of the Uyghur people’s legitimate demands for human rights, democracy and freedom.”
Given these concerns, Beijing has had trouble getting counter-terrorism against ETIM or other separatist groups included in the broader international fight against terrorism. That’s something China would like to change, and it showed in Beijing’s response to the tragedy in Paris.
Read the full story at The Diplomat