Thread: Jackie Chan: Chinese People Need To Be Controlled

I thought he is a good man.



HONG KONG - Action star Jackie Chan 's comments wondering whether Chinese people "need to be controlled" have drawn sharp rebuke in his native Hong Kong and in Taiwan .
Chan told a business forum in the southern Chinese province of Hainan that a free society may not be beneficial for China 's authoritarian mainland.
"I'm not sure if it's good to have freedom or not," Chan said Saturday. "I'm gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we're not being controlled, we'll just do what we want."
He went on to say that freedoms in Hong Kong and Taiwan made those societies "chaotic."
Chan's comments drew applause from a predominantly Chinese audience of business leaders, but did not sit well with lawmakers in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
"He's insulted the Chinese people. Chinese people aren't pets," Hong Kong pro-democracy legislator Leung Kwok-hung told The Associated Press. "Chinese society needs a democratic system to protect human rights and rule of law."
Another lawmaker, Albert Ho, called the comments "racist," adding: "People around the world are running their own countries. Why can't Chinese do the same?"
Former British colony Hong Kong enjoys Western-style civil liberties and some democratic elections under Chinese rule. Half of its 60-member legislature is elected, with the other half picked by special interest groups. But Hong Kong's leader is chosen by a panel stacked with Beijing loyalists.
In democratically self-ruled Taiwan, which split from mainland China during a civil war in 1949, legislator Huang Wei-che said Chan himself "has enjoyed freedom and democracy and has reaped the economic benefits of capitalism. But he has yet to grasp the true meaning of freedom and democracy."
Chan's comments were reported by news outlets in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but were ignored by the mainland Chinese press.
Although Chan was a fierce critic of the brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in June 1989, which killed at least hundreds, he has not publicly criticized China's government in recent years and is immensely popular on the mainland.
He performed during the opening and closing ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics and took part in the Olympic torch relay .
Chan also is vice chairman of the China Film Association, a key industry group.
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Originally Posted by min0 lee

Unfortunately there's nothing we can do to change it, nor should we get involved Chobby.

If we can't help them, then we shouldn't harm them either.


Washington betrays China's Uighurs
By Erkin Dolat

The United States government has officially placed the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), an obscure group even most Uighurs know nothing about, on its Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) list. US Deputy State Secretary Richard Armitage on Monday announced this decision in Beijing, saying that the US government had put ETIM on its terrorist list after "careful study".

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that although the US would freeze ETIM's assets, a decision had not been made on whether to designate this group officially a terrorist organization.

On the surface, this move appears to be a small concession by the United States to reward the Chinese government for its support of the anti-terror war and for issuing new export controls on missile technology. However, the political implication of this decision is disastrous to the Uighur freedom movement worldwide and to the ever-deteriorating human-rights situation in East Turkestan. This decision by the United States will justify China's claim since September 11 that "East Turkestan terrorist forces" are part of an international terrorist network, and legitimize China's aggressive clampdown on any form of Uighur dissent, no matter how non-violent and peaceful they may be.

By including ETIM on the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations, the United States has in effect betrayed the Uighur freedom movement and opened the floodgates of Chinese persecution against the Uighur people. It is a strategic mistake on the part of the United States in order to get some short-term benefits out of China. While the United States seems to have conceded little to Beijing, in fact China has been given the license to nip the Uighur freedom movement in the bud. This will result in more arrests and executions of the Uighurs by the Chinese government in the future by linking them with the so-called East Turkestan Islamic Movement.

China, which has been aggressively demonizing and discrediting the East Turkestan freedom movement since September 11, now has a free hand to strike a harder blow against the Uighur population in the country's west in the name of fighting against "East Turkestan terrorist forces". Now China can practically label any Uighur dissident a "terrorist" who has links to the East Turkestan Islamic Movement or other "terrorist" organizations. Basically, the United States has given a green light to whatever China wants to do with those Uighur people who are opposed to the authoritarian Chinese rule in East Turkestan unless the US directly confronts China on its violations of Uighur human rights.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Kong Quan, welcoming the US decision on Tuesday, said: "China and the United States shared extensive common interests in the field of anti-terrorism. For a long period of time, ETIM and other East Turkestan organizations had joined other international terrorist forces in creating many violent terrorist incidents inside and outside China, posing grave threats to regional security and stability." Kong Quan emphasized at the end of briefing, "Facts have proven that 'East Turkestan' organizations are part of international terrorist forces and constitute a scourge of the international community that all nations should join efforts to combat."

While the executive order of US President George W Bush only authorizes economic controls over ETIM, the Chinese government is saying that all the East Turkestan organizations are "terrorist" organizations and is urging the international community to combat them. This means all the democratic Uighur organizations that promote non-violence and dialogue in Central Asia, Turkey, Australia, Europe and the United States are "terrorist" organizations and that the respective countries should join efforts to combat them. Apparently, the interpretation of ETIM's inclusion on the FTO list is a totally different thing to the US and China. China wants the US decision to serve its political ends, which is to eradicate permanently Uighur opposition to the tyrannical Chinese rule in East Turkestan since 1949.

Armitage while in Beijing emphasized to Chinese officials "the absolute necessity to respect minority rights" as the country moves forward with "a very difficult, anti-terrorism, counter-terrorism fight with ETIM". China will definitely fight against ETIM "terrorists" but without any regard to the fundamental human rights of the Uighur people, who basically have had no rights at all since September 11. It is politically naive on the part of the United States to assume that China will somehow respect the rights of the Uighur population in its fight against the Uighur "terrorists". The cold fact is that China has hardly respected the inalienable rights of Uighurs and will continue to violate them as long as the United States and the international community justify China's heavy-handed policy against the Uighur people.

The US decision to include ETIM on its list of foreign terrorist organizations came as a shock to the Uighur people in East Turkestan and the Uighur diaspora, because the United States had earlier consistently rejected China's claim that the East Turkestan organizations were "terrorist" groups. Bush, attending the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit last year in Shanghai, said the war on terrorism should not be used as an excuse to persecute minorities. Francis Taylor, director for counter-terrorism at the US State Department, said last December in Beijing, "The US doesn't designate or consider the East Turkestan organization as a terrorist organization. The legitimate economic and social issues that confront the people in Western China are not necessarily terrorist issues and should be resolved politically rather than using counter-terrorism methods."

Apparently, the current US position on the issue has shifted dramatically to the opposite pole because of its national interests and political needs. According to the Wall Street Journal (August 27 edition), China and the US are trading concessions as part of their common fight against terrorism. And the Los Angeles Times says the move against ETIM pleased Beijing, which is anxious to portray its crackdown on restive Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang as part of the global campaign against terrorism. The Washington Post says the Chinese government has been pressing Washington for months to include the group on the terrorist list, an act that triggers financial sanctions and immigration controls. According to the Wall Street Journal, diplomats in Beijing say the group's ties to terrorists are sketchy. All of these prove that the US decision to include ETIM on its FTO list is more a political tradeoff with Beijing than a reflection of political reality.

Hasan Mahsum, leader of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, in a rare interview with Radio Free Asia Uighur Service on January 22, denied that his group had any connection with al-Qaeda or the Taliban. Mahsum said, "The East Turkestan Islamic Party hasn't received any financial assistance from Osama bin Laden or his al-Qaeda organization. We don't have any kind of organizational links with al-Qaeda or the Taliban. Involvement by some Uighur individuals with the Taliban doesn't mean that the East Turkestan Islamic Party has relations with the Taliban."

The New York Times on August 27 reported that the East Turkestan Islamic Movement was virtually unknown until last winter, when China asserted that it was linked to al-Qaeda. The paper said the group has played at most a small role in the simmering ethnic unrest in Xinjiang, where Muslims of the Uighur ethnic group, few of whom are fundamentalists, chafe at China's stringent rule. It concludes that the certified condemnation might help China describe its often heavy-handed repression in Xinjiang as a necessary flank in the global anti-terror campaign, not as an issue of human rights.

This is bad news for the Uighur people both in East Turkestan and abroad. This means the Uighur issue will no longer be looked at as a human-rights issue but as a terrorism issue. This also means the US will mute its criticism of China's violation of Uighur human rights in its fight against the "terrorists" of ETIM.

The Uighur people will pay the price of this betrayal by the United States government. This is, of course, not the first time that the Uighurs have been betrayed by a foreign power for its own national interest. In 1949, as most Uighurs still remember, the Soviet Union betrayed the independent East Turkestan Republic into the hands of communist China.

The Uighur people understand, as longtime victims of the Great Game, that politics is filthy, especially when a great power betrays an individual, group or even a state for its own national interest. This time, the Uighur people have seen how dirty it can get when the US sacrifices them for getting some short-term benefit from China. In the past, the Uighurs have seen the United States as the beacon of democracy and bulwark of human rights and freedom. The Uighurs have also considered the United States as the only power on Earth that can truly challenge and pressure China in terms of human rights and religious freedom. However, the US decision to include ETIM on its FTO list has proved that the opposite is sometimes also true.

The majority of Uighurs are opposed to terrorism and violence. They don't believe that they can justify their legitimate struggle against China with violence or armed resistance. That is why they strongly sympathized with the American people when terrorists rammed hijacked planes into the World Trade Center towers in New York City and the Pentagon near Washington, DC. As a matter of fact, the Uighur people have been victims of systematic Chinese state terrorism. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have cited Chinese mistreatment of Uighurs, including torture, arrests, disappearances and summary executions. Both organizations accuse China of fully taking advantage of the US war on terror to legitimize its crackdown of the Uighurs. Amnesty says China singles out Uighur political prisoners for execution. In China, the label of "terrorist" or "terrorism" is specifically reserved to the Uighurs.

The Uighur struggle against Chinese rule is as legitimate as the Tibetan struggle. Both peoples have suffered Chinese persecution and both of their countries were occupied by China at almost the same time. The Uighurs believe in Islam while the Tibetans believe in Tibetan Buddhism. This is probably the main difference between these two groups of distinct and indigenous peoples who want to separate from China and form independent states. It is obvious that religion is quite significant in international politics, since the association of one religion may negatively affect one's freedom cause while the association of another can actually become a blessing. This is the case with regard to the Uighurs and Tibetans. Since the Uighurs are Muslims and have a separatist cause, they can be easily demonized as "terrorists" while the Tibetan Buddhists are looked at with a different light.

But both groups may have to pay the price of betrayal to some degree. The US government, by legitimizing Chinese suppression of the Uighur people, can't avoid legitimizing Chinese suppression of Tibetans, for Beijing looks at both groups as having the same separatist tendencies. The green light given to China to crack down the Uighurs will be looked at as a yellow light in Beijing to clamp down on the Tibetans. The Tibetans will feel more or less the same heat of the US decision to allow China to suppress the Uighurs, who, like Tibetans, have greatly suffered under communist Chinese tyranny for the past five decades.

The US decision to allow China to crack down on the East Turkestan "terrorists" has left the Uighurs alone in the world without a friend to turn to for help and without an option to deal with Chinese tyranny. This decision will further alienate them and push them to desperation. This move may force some non-violent Uighurs to believe that armed struggle is the only way to resolve the East Turkestan problem. This is the danger that many Uighur organizations see in the West. As a self-fulfilling prophecy, the US justification of Chinese persecution of the Uighur people will probably radicalize even the moderate Uighur Muslims who otherwise will look at America as a light of hope.

Erkin Dolat is the editor-in-chief of the Uyghur Information Agency.