China’s President Xi Jinping has arrived in Urumqi to attend the 70th anniversary of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, according to state media reports, making him the first national leader to attend such a landmark celebration.
Established by the central government in October 1955, Xinjiang is one of China’s five autonomous regions with significant ethnic minority populations. At least 10 million Uygurs, who are predominantly Muslim, live in the region.
Yu Zhengsheng, then the fourth-ranking member of the Communist Party’s top body, the seven-member Politburo Standing Committee, presided over the 60th anniversary in 2015.
Xi, who carried out an inspection tour in Xinjiang in July 2022, arrived in Urumqi on Tuesday afternoon as Beijing puts a firm focus on ethnic unity and the deeper integration of ethnic minority groups into the Chinese nation.
This is part of Xi’s concept of a “sense of community for the Chinese nation”, which emphasises a unified national identity for China as a whole, rather than focusing on individual ethnic identities, and includes “sinicising religion”. Beijing has repeatedly warned against the infiltration of extremist Islamic ideologies from abroad into Xinjiang.
Xi Jinping attends Tibet anniversary events
Xi Jinping attends Tibet anniversary events
Chen Xiaojiang, the newly appointed party secretary of Xinjiang and who was the first Han Chinese head of the State Ethnic Affairs Commission, is widely seen as key to promoting Xi’s concept of the “Chinese nation community”.
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