As Ramadan approaches, the Chinese Muslims fear that China will forbid them to pray in mosques

2024.03.12

As Ramadan began this week, global leaders such as U.S. President Joe Biden, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan extended their well-wishes to the over 1.8 billion Muslims worldwide. In contrast, China’s President Xi Jinping did not acknowledge Ramadan, despite the presence of approximately 11 million mostly Muslim Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples in Xinjiang, as well as around 7 million other Muslims across China.

China has been cracking down on Uyghurs in Xinjiang for decades, citing concerns about religious extremism and separatism. The Chinese government aims to make Islam “compatible” with Chinese culture by aligning it with traditional Chinese values as defined by Beijing.

Ramadan began less than a week after Ma Xingrui, the Communist Party secretary in Xinjiang, declared the “inevitability” of Islam’s Sinicization. Uyghur rights organizations have expressed concerns about potential crackdowns during Ramadan, which runs from the evening of March 10 to April 9.

Ma stated at the National People’s Congress in Beijing on March 7, according to a VOA report, “Everyone knows the need for Sinicization of Islam in Xinjiang. This is an inevitable trend.”

Since 2017, China has imposed restrictions or bans on religious practices among Uyghurs in an effort to eradicate “religious extremism.” This crackdown has led to the mass detention of nearly 2 million Muslims, the destruction of mosques, and severe human rights violations in Xinjiang, which the U.S. and others have described as genocide and crimes against humanity.

In 2023, authorities prohibited Uyghurs in many parts of the region from praying in mosques and homes during Eid al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan, allowing only senior citizens to pray in mosques under heavy police surveillance.

During the previous Ramadan, authorities in Kashgar even paid Muslim Uyghur men to perform dances outside Xinjiang’s most famous mosque to celebrate the end of the holy month. This performance was filmed and released by state media ahead of an anticipated visit by the U.N. human rights chief.