India and China: Will the Taliban turn foes into Friends?

06 May, 2001    ·   491

Parama Sinha Palit sees a potential for cooperation between India and China in containing Islamic fundamentalism sponsored by the Taliban in Kashmir and Xinjiang
Parama Sinha Palit
Since 1962, India and China have not been the best of friends. Chinese military support to Pakistan has placed a greater distance between them. However, the importance of breaking the ice  is realised by  them. This  was reflected in Li Peng’s visit to India in January 2001. He is next only to President Jiang Zemin and is ranked above Premier Zhu Rongji in the political hierarchy.  

 

 

Among other reasons, the visit could have been prompted by the rapid spread of the Taliban syndrome and political instability in the Xinjiang province, where Uighur Muslims are seeking independence. Their activities are threatening China and Central Asia too. Hence, in April 2000, Kazakhstan , Kyrgyztan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan signed an agreement for jointly tackling terrorism, political and religious extremism, multinational organised crime, and other security threats.   

 

 

China has strong reasons for feeling threatened by Islamic fundamentalism. The Muslim population in China , in 1990, was around 17 million. Among these, the Hui Muslims hail from Central Asia and Persian Gulf , who intermarried with the Han Chinese. The Turkic Muslims of China’s western province consist of Uighurs, Tajiks, Kazak and Kyrgyz groups. This second category populates Xinjiang or ‘the new frontier’. 

 

 

Xinjiang, which is rich in natural resources like, coal, petroleum and oil, was formally annexed by China in 1884. It has a long history of struggles for independence. While the Huis assimilated and adapted the parent Han culture of China , their Turkic counterparts are unable to do so. They have maintained their distinct cultural and religious identity for decades. Unlike India , the Chinese political regime does not entertain cultural and political pluralism. As a result, the Turkic Muslim minority of Xinjiang has often felt isolated.

 

 

The disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of Muslim-dominated states in Central Asia in the early 1990s has given a strong fillip to the aspirations for independence of Muslims in Xinjiang. The stiff resistance offered by the Mujahideen to Soviet advances in Afghanistan   paved the way for their  ambitions.  The establishment of rabid Taliban rule in Afghanistan and its efforts to carve out a pan-Islamic diaspora as part of the ‘jihad’ agenda has made China wary of Islamic fundamentalism within its territory. These apprehensions have been strengthened by the political difficulties in Tajikistan .

 

 

Chinese fears of an Islamic backlash have been confirmed by skirmishes between national security forces and Uighur separatists. The Chinese Government suspects infiltration by Islamic militants as a major factor behind this unrest, which is a belief, shared by India with regard to separatist violence in Kashmir . The Taliban, has thus emerged as a common concern for India and China . 

 

 

It is ironical that the mutual border, a ticklish issue between India and China , has been treated with disdain by the terrorists. There are reports of Uighurs from Xinjiang carrying out terrorist operations in Kashmir . Some of the captured militants actually admitted to being trained by Pan-Islamic Jihadis in Pakistan ’s Baluchistan province, and crossing over to India from POK, along with Lashkar-e-Toiba infiltrators. Both communist China and democratic India are perceived as threats to the growth of Islam. India has tried to persuade China of the need to combat Islamic terrorism jointly. Xinjiang shares borders with Pakistan ’s North West Frontier Province and Afghanistan making China vulnerable to secessionist designs. 

 

 

Li Peng’s visit saw a further step in carrying forward the Sino-Indian initiative for tackling terrorism. During Kargil, China had strongly rebuffed Pakistan . The Chinese White Paper issued last year does not list India as a security threat.  Despite being at cross-purposes on issues like dumping Chinese imports in India , the border problem and nuclear cooperation with Pakistan , the Taliban syndrome is bridging the gap between the two nations. It remains to be seen whether this threat can override China 's bias towards Pakistan . 

 

 

By carrying dogmatism to the extreme, the Taliban has shocked the entire world. On the flip side, however, it is uniting old foes. Acts of demolishing Buddha statues and Buddhist murals in Afghanistan has stunned the world. Being the treasurer of one of the most ancient heritages of the world, China too, can only condemn these heinous actions. And inch closer to India on one more  common cause.

 

 

 

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