I went into New York yesterday to drop off my application and paperwork for a Z (working) visa and was completely and utterly rejected. Seems that my working permit indicates that I'll be living in China for purposes of employment, while my invitation letter says I'll be participating in a vague-sounding "exchange program".

My employer ensures me that this is the same phrasing they've used to obtain Z visas for other foreign experts in the past... but as you all know, what used to be good enough isn't cutting the mustard these days. A new invitation letter is on the way, but since it's issued by the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs there's no telling how long it'll take. My flight back to Beijing on July 17 is in serious jeopardy.

Not that I'm the only one complaining, by any means. Having it out with a visa officer in the line next to mine was what I think — using my super-powers of ethnic stereotyping and observation — was an ex-Soviet middle-aged Jewish businessman. He was screaming through the glass partition, "I've been to China ten times! I never had problems getting a visa before! I'm going to be entering through Kazakhstan but leaving by plane! Don't you know that there are valid land crossings into China?!?"

So, I'll just have to sit and wait. The best part was when I complained to the visa officer that getting a new invitation letter from China was "tai mafan" (too much trouble), and she responded, "Not as much trouble as Chinese people have getting a US visa." What, is this some sort of contest?

She reminded me of the commenter who frequently tells me that nothing would make him happier than seeing a purported splittist sympathizer get denied entry into China. I remain optimistic.

Two vaguely related news items today, both of which tie into the whole pre-Olympic security craziness we've been living through in China lately...

First, the Olympic torch is heading to Xinjiang on Wednesday... probably. Surprised? So is everybody else, because the festivities have suddenly been moved forward a week. The torch relay was kinda maybe sorta supposed to go through Tibet this week, but those plans are up in the air and very hush hush. (Translation: nobody know what the f#%! is going on.)

AFP has published a prequel follow-up on the whole "Uyghurs bomb a police station" story from last week. The first article indicated that the attack was in response to a heavy-handed police crackdown in Xinjiang. This article — again based on an interview with a spokesman for the World Uyghur Congress — fleshes out a few details:

China has tightened controls on Muslims in its remote west ahead of the Olympic torch's arrival next week to thwart any actions aimed at disrupting the relay, residents and exiles said.

The measures include detaining thousands in the Xinjiang region and forcing Muslim religious officials to undergo "political education" on "protecting" the Olympics, said Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the Germany-based World Uighur Congress.

With the Beijing Olympic torch expected in Xinjiang on its nationwide tour, authorities have also confiscated the passports of some Muslims, Uighurs told AFP.

"They are afraid people might travel abroad and join some sort of plot against the Olympics," said a college-educated Uighur woman in her twenties, whose passport was taken by police here earlier this year.

The woman, whose name was withheld by AFP to protect her from police reprisals, was forced to cancel plans to attend graduate school overseas....

Beijing Olympic organisers recently said the sensitive Xinjiang torch leg would take place June 17-19, a week earlier than planned. It originally was to transit the capital Urumqi, Kashgar, and two other cities.

However, Olympic officials last week would not disclose up-to-date plans to AFP amid confusion surrounding sensitive relay legs following violent unrest in Tibet in March that laid bare simmering discontent in China's minority regions.

A stage was set up near Kashgar's main mosque, apparently for torch ceremonies, but residents said there had been no new announcement on when the flame would arrive.

China has blamed the confusion on schedule changes caused by the May 12 Sichuan earthquake.

Raxit said Muslims in Kashgar have also been ordered to avoid any contact with foreigners, report any overseas journalists operating in the area and sign pledges denouncing separatism and supporting Beijing.

Thousands of Muslims who were not residents of Kashgar and Urumqi also had been forced to leave those cities, he said.

I've even heard that some cities in Xinjiang are now issuing strange new local residence cards to foreigners, to sort out the good from the bad.

Of course, Xinjiang isn't alone in suffering from "the confusion" sweeping across China these days. Everywhere I go in Beijing, I hear foreigners complaining about visa troubles. I, too, am amongst those who will have to return to their home countries now that the Hong Kong visa run has become a nightmare.
••••

The second item is a review of Charles Cummings' new China thriller, Typhoon, with a plot particularly relevant to the news above:

In Charles Cumming's well-timed and excellently executed Typhoon... the pantomime villain lurking in the background this time is the spectre of Islamic fundamentalism.

This might at first glance seem opportunistic and a mite improbable, but that only reflects one of the book's key themes: how little any of us know or apparently cares, especially since 9/11, about the rampant human rights abuses in China's other controverisally annexed province: Xinjiang....

Swoop on a decade to almost the present day and Joe goes back to China to find all his old nemeses waiting for him, coiled up within a cold-blooded maverick plot to use Uighur separatists to damage China's reputation on the eve of the Olympic Games.

Now where would he ever come up with a plot like that? I'll have to try and get my hands on a copy when I'm back in the U.S. next month.

China has tightened controls on Muslims in its remote west ahead of the Olympic torch's arrival next week to thwart any actions aimed at disrupting the relay, residents and exiles said.

The measures include detaining thousands in the Xinjiang region and forcing Muslim religious officials to undergo "political education" on "protecting" the Olympics, said Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the Germany-based World Uighur Congress.

With the Beijing Olympic torch expected in Xinjiang on its nationwide tour, authorities have also confiscated the passports of some Muslims, Uighurs told AFP.

"They are afraid people might travel abroad and join some sort of plot against the Olympics," said a college-educated Uighur woman in her twenties, whose passport was taken by police here earlier this year.

The woman, whose name was withheld by AFP to protect her from police reprisals, was forced to cancel plans to attend graduate school overseas.

Calls to police and government officials in the Xinjiang capital Urumqi went unanswered at the weekend.

Beijing says it faces a separatist Muslim terror threat in Xinjiang, a vast region of deserts and stunning mountain ranges which is home to more than eight million Uighurs, a Central Asian people who have long chafed under Chinese control.

In recent months China has said several Xinjiang-based terror plots have been smashed, including some specifically aimed at the August 8-24 Olympics.

Uighurs dismiss such claims as political cover for what they call decades of repression and policies aimed at extinguishing their culture.

Exile groups say thousands of Uighurs have been rounded up in the run-up to the Olympics.

"(The crackdown) is intended to prevent Uighurs from telling foreign reporters and visitors the truth of their suffering," Rebiya Kadeer, head of the Uighur American Association, told AFP last month.

Beijing Olympic organisers recently said the sensitive Xinjiang torch leg would take place June 17-19, a week earlier than planned. It originally was to transit the capital Urumqi, Kashgar, and two other cities.

However, Olympic officials last week would not disclose up-to-date plans to AFP amid confusion surrounding sensitive relay legs following violent unrest in Tibet in March that laid bare simmering discontent in China's minority regions.

A stage was set up near Kashgar's main mosque, apparently for torch ceremonies, but residents said there had been no new announcement on when the flame would arrive.

China has blamed the confusion on schedule changes caused by the May 12 Sichuan earthquake.

Raxit said Muslims in Kashgar have also been ordered to avoid any contact with foreigners, report any overseas journalists operating in the area and sign pledges denouncing separatism and supporting Beijing.

Thousands of Muslims who were not residents of Kashgar and Urumqi also had been forced to leave those cities, he said.

"The Chinese Communists have enslaved the Uighurs politically. The Uighurs have lost all rights," he told AFP.

Activity in Kashgar, an oasis city on the ancient Silk Road, appeared normal at the weekend, with skull-capped Muslim men quietly streaming in and out of the Id Kah mosque. There was no obvious police presence.

Several Uighurs told AFP they welcomed the torch and disputed suggestions anyone would try to disrupt it.

"The Olympic torch has never been to our city. We are very proud," said a Kashgar taxi driver named Yusup.

The crackdown triggered an attack with rocks and petrol bombs by Uighurs on a police station in the town of Sangong in late May, Raxit said previously.

Local police confirmed the attack when contacted by AFP, but refused further comment.

Worthy of the master
Peter Millar
14 June 2008
The Times

TYPHOON by Charles Cumming

NOT SINCE The Honourable Schoolboy has there been a satisfactory spy novel about Britain's relations with China: the global power of the 19th century tussling with that of the 21st, all the time complicated by that still bolshie 20th-century giant, America.

The obvious fulcrum is Hong Kong. In John le Carre's book - perhaps the most underrated of all his prodigious output - the ogre offstage is the Soviet Union, but it is the one-sided "special relationship" that provides the sweet and-sour flavour.

In Charles Cumming's well-timed and excellently executed Typhoon, the seasoning is similar, though the pantomime villain lurking in the background this time is the spectre of Islamic fundamentalism.

This might at first glance seem opportunistic and a mite improbable, but that only reflects one of the book's key themes: how little any of us know or apparently cares, especially since 9/11, about the rampant human rights abuses in China's other controverisally annexed province: Xinjiang.

Also known - though not by the Chinese - as Eastern Turkestan, this ancient homeland of the mainly Muslim Uighur people lies to the north of Tibet, but has suffered every bit as much repression as separatist movements, backed up by allegations of "terrorist" attacks.

Typhoon begins in 1997 in Hong Kong on the eve of the handover with Joe Lennox, a young SIS operative deeply in love with his beautiful half-French girlfriend, worried about telling her the truth about his job, and where to party as the flag comes down.

In the background is Miles Coolidge, a cynical, hard-bitten CIA operative whose overriding ambition is to have sex with as many attractive women as a career spent in East Asia can offer. Including, as an exotic extra, those attached to other men.

As the empire surrenders Hong Kong to China, so Joe is doomed to lose Isabella to Miles. At the same time he also loses his first high-profile case: a supposedly prominent defector who disappears from a "safe" house.

Swoop on a decade to almost the present day and Joe goes back to China to find all his old nemeses waiting for him, coiled up within a cold-blooded maverick plot to use Uighur separatists to damage China's reputation on the eve of the Olympic Games.

The story is narrated by a third party bit-player, ostensibly a journalist on the SIS payroll, with the full benefit of hindsight, which gives it a further le Carre-esque touch: that all-knowing, mildly wistful feeling of an inquest.

The comparison is a heavy one for a young author, but Typhoon, with its deep plotting, flawed characters, climactic conclusion and undercurrent of mistrust is another step in the footprints of the master.

It's official... in less than 24 hours the entire country will know that I'm an ass. If you're in the Middle Kingdom and own a television, make an effort to watch China Right Here on Tianjin TV tonight (Saturday) at 6pm.

Hear me talk about never leaving Xinjiang, always being the sundried tomato king, and various other nonsense. Watch me ride a camel, as if that's something I did every day. Sigh.

The previous entries about making this program are here and here. I'll try to get a copy of the show and upload it to YouTube someday, unless one of you beats me to it.

John Bellinger — previously a legal adviser to the National Security Council and currently shoveling shit over at the State Department — served as the Bush administration witness du jour.

A transcript of the hearing indicates that there is at least some congressional support for allowing the Uyghurs in limbo to start new lives in the United States:

BELLINGER: You mentioned the case of the Uighurs, I think, Mr. Rohrabacher. But that's where diplomatic assurances come in, because if we don't have a good alternative, if the alternative is to let the person go into the United States, I think you will be hearing from your constituents as to why are we letting someone go, who poses a risk to our country.

ROHRABACHER: Well, the question with the Uighurs, of course, was that the chairman and I have actually come to the conclusion — and I've looked at it — they were not a threat to the United States. In fact, perhaps their original incarceration was an error in judgment.

And when we have an error in judgment, again, we should admit it, and in this case not send them back to communist China, because of communist China's human rights record, and instead by admitting our mistake, permit them to stay here. The chairman and I in fact are signing a letter to that accord to the State Department.

The representatives also brought up the recently released information on Uyghur detainees being prepared for interrogation by the Chinese at Gitmo:

PITTS: Just to follow up on this Uighur situation, the Department of Justice inspector general report had a very interesting relevant footnote 134, where the IG revealed that an FBI agent told the IG that the Chinese government officials came to Guantanamo and interrogated the Uighurs being detained there by the U.S. military.

And he reported that at the request of the Chinese government interrogators, these people, the Uighur detainees, were subjected first to forced sleeplessness, and then low temperature room for night and day, before questioning by the Chinese officials.

The key point here is that U.S. government officials invited the very Chinese government that mistreated the Uighurs, caused them to flee China, and they were allowed by the U.S. to interrogate them at a highly restricted U.S. military base, where ironically members of Congress are not even allowed to talk to the detainees.

And allegedly, the U.S. military personnel were directed to soften them up, abuse them, whatever you want to call it, before getting them ready for questioning by the Chinese officials.

Who made the decision to allow the Chinese government to interrogate a persecuted religious minority in a U.S. military base? Who would make that decision?

BELLINGER: Sir, I would assume that would be the Department of Defense, and you would have to put the question to them. I will say, trying to connect this with the chairman's question, that we are concerned about the situation of the Uighurs.

We made the decision early on that because we thought they would be mistreated if returned to China, that even though a number of years back we had concluded not that they were wrongly picked up — they were picked up because they were in a training camp in Afghanistan — but it was concluded rapidly that they were not trying to fight us, but they were trying to fight the Chinese.

So we made the decision early on that they needed to be sent somewhere, but they just couldn't be sent back to China. But as far as that decision in Guantanamo, sir, you would have to ask the Defense Department.

DELAHUNT: Would the gentleman yield for a moment?

PITTS: Yes, Mr. Chairman.

DELAHUNT: I think — and we will obviously invite the Department of Defense to come before us and explain why the communist Chinese security agents were allowed to interrogate the Uighurs — that's a question that must be posed, and I think my friend from California concurs with me on that.

ROHRABACHER: If the gentleman — Mr. Pitts — would...

PITTS: Yes.

ROHRABACHER: I do concur, and I would associate myself with the outrage of Mr. Pitts and my chairman. And the fact is that this stems from a fundamentally flawed China policy itself, that this administration treats one of the world's most vicious dictatorships as if it is a country like Belgium or a democratic country.

And what we are seeing is flowing from that fundamental error on the part of the administration, or amoral policy of the administration, so I associate myself with — I'm more outraged than both of my colleagues on this.

And thus settling the question of who was most outraged, the meeting was adjourned. I'd like to post the full transcript below, but it's more than 20,000 words. If anyone really wants to read it, let me know.

If you need to catch up, read the first part of this ongoing series. Department of Defense bozos, you're on notice... stay tuned for Softening 'Em Up III!

I was checking out Frog in a Well's interesting collection of 20th century Chinese currency, when I suddenly remembered taking the picture you see above two years ago in the Xinjiang Museum.

I'm not exactly sure if you can call it a bank note (it says something about being a "construction bond"), but the imagery is fantastic and it comes from an interesting period in Xinjiang history.

The text along the bottom reads "printed in the 30th year of the Republic of China" above the date, 1941... during the decade between the briefly independent First and Second East Turkestan Republics, when Sheng Shicai ruled with an iron fist and Moscow more or less called the shots in Xinjiang. Chairman Mao's little brother, Mao Zemin, was living in Urumqi at the time and became the proud father of a baby boy that year, named Mao Yuanxin. (Mao Zemin and his pregnant wife were arrested by Sheng Shicai and the baby was born in prison. Mao Zemin was executed in Urumqi two years later, and the baby grew up to become a central figure in the Cultural Revolution and an ally of the Gang of Four.)

And check out the engraved imagery. How much more could they pack in there? You've got poorly rendered quasi-Nationalist soldiers, Soviet tanks, a smoke-belching factory, the Emin Minaret in Turpan, several monoplanes, a biplane, and the shifting sands of the Taklamakan Desert. That's not to mention text in Uyghur, Chinese, and Mongolian.

Click on the image above for a closer look.

Late news tonight from AFP of an attack on a police station last week in Sangong, Xinjiang. The town appears to be right near China's border with Kazakhstan:

Ethnic Uighur Muslims in western China have attacked a police station with rocks and petrol bombs to protest a pre-Olympic crackdown, an exiled group said Friday.

The petrol bomb attack occurred last week in Sangong township in China's western-most Xinjiang region, Dilxat Raxit, spokesman of the German-based World Uighur Congress, told AFP.

Local police confirmed the attack when asked by AFP, but refused to comment further on the case.

Raxit said it was prompted by a police crackdown aimed at heading off unrest among the Uighurs, the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang region, ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August.

No further details at the moment, but I'll check again in the morning and update this post if anything new comes out. The AFP article is posted below.

Ethnic Uighur Muslims in western China have attacked a police station with rocks and petrol bombs to protest a pre-Olympic crackdown, an exiled group said Friday.

The petrol bomb attack occurred last week in Sangong township in China's western-most Xinjiang region, Dilxat Raxit, spokesman of the German-based World Uighur Congress, told AFP.

Local police confirmed the attack when asked by AFP, but refused to comment further on the case.

Raxit said it was prompted by a police crackdown aimed at heading off unrest among the Uighurs, the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang region, ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August.

"The Chinese authorities are using the opportunity of the Olympic Games to oppress the Uighur population," Raxit said.

"They are arresting people without any legal procedure... anyone they suspect of being opposed to the Chinese government is being rounded up."

Xinjiang is home to over 8.3 million Uighurs, a Muslim central Asian people who have long chafed under Beijing's control.

Many accuse China of harsh oppression and policies that they say are aimed at extinguishing their culture.

Raxit said the attack occurred after peaceful attempts to end the ongoing police crackdown proved ineffective.

Following last week's attack, the police crackdown has intensified, with "several dozens" of young Uighurs suspected of taking part being taken into police custody, he added.

Up in the title bar I claim to focus on northwest China, though that almost always means writing about Xinjiang, and occasionally Tibet. Today, though, I'd like to turn your attention to Gansu for a moment.

When the earthquake struck on May 12, Sichuan was absolutely devastated, but southern Gansu was also hit hard. 364 people were killed and thousands of buildings were damaged or destroyed. The scale of the disaster pales in comparison to what happened in Mianyang, Mianzhu, Aba, etc... but there are plenty of other people out there blogging about Sichuan.

An article in yesterday's South China Morning Post publicized Gansu earthquake victims' complaints that the aid they're receiving is inadequate and slow to arrive:

Zhang Quanshou, party secretary of Ranjia village, reachable only by a treacherous switchback mountain road, said they desperately needed more tents. All 72 houses in the village had collapsed.

"We know the governments are not deserting us, but we do need more help," a tearful Mr Zhang said.

Huang Huawen, party secretary of Yulei township, whose 5,670 villagers lost much of their farmland to two reservoirs, said township authorities had been overwhelmed in the first days after disaster struck, because they were left to themselves to cope. The township had received 800 tents but would need another 1,000, he said.

Many in Wen county have been dismayed by the scant support. Some blame a gagging order by the province's publicity department on media coverage of the quake's impact on Gansu.

"It's ridiculous to watch Gansu reporters in Sichuan covering the quake while the hardship at their doorsteps is ignored," Mr Huang said.

Everyone appreciates the enormous difficulty of conducting relief operations on the scale of what we're seeing now in Sichuan, but it's important to make sure that no one gets left out... after all, an earthquake victim is a victim no matter if they live in Sichuan, Gansu, Shaanxi, Chongqing, Henan, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, or Yunnan (all of which suffered at least one quake-related death, according to Wikipedia).

SCMP also reported last week that the more than 100 pandas in Gansu's Baishuijiang National Nature Reserve have vanished without a trace:

Not a single panda has been seen by inspectors at the Baishuijiang National Nature Reserve in Gansu's Wen county, the world's biggest panda reserve, according to reserve director Li Shiren.

Mr. Li said the animals were easy to find before the May 12 quake....

Mr Li said the quake triggered many landslides in the reserve, and most of the roads built last year to monitor the animals were damaged.

Adventures in Gansu have given me a number of priceless memories over these past few years in China, so I figure I owe the province a bit of attention every once in a while. The areas of Gansu along the border with Sichuan are incredibly remote, and I hope you'll keep the people (and pandas) there affected by the earthquake in your thoughts.

Go, go, Gansu! 甘肃加油! You can read the full articles from SCMP below.

The villagers were agitated. The May 12 earthquake flattened nearly all their timber-and-clay homes or left them too dangerous to live in, yet they are struggling for shelter and the summer harvest is looming.

They had still received only "1 metre" of plastic sheeting per person, "but we need at least 6 metres to make one tent", said Jiuzhai villager Chen Shuqin .

Deputy township chief Cao Bin said: "We were told to arrange our own vehicles to ferry in relief supplies."

The people of Jiuzhai and tens of thousands like them in Wen county, one of the poorest areas of Gansu province , itself among the nation's poorest, have largely been left to fend for themselves in the three weeks since the magnitude 8 quake killed 365 of their neighbours and injured 10,157.

The survivors are still waiting for the sort of relief poured into Sichuan , the worst-affected province where more than 68,000 are known to have died.

Only a few local vehicles carrying relief supplies ply the roads.

In Jiuzhai, Mrs Chen, a mother in her early 30s, said: "We have to share one makeshift tent with several neighbours."

Mr Cao is in charge of distributing relief materials to 2,526 households in Tielou township. He said only about 500 tents had arrived and most had been given to families living higher up in the mountains, where almost all the homes collapsed.

Zhang Quanshou , party secretary of Ranjia village, reachable only by a treacherous switchback mountain road, said they desperately needed more tents. All 72 houses in the village had collapsed.

"We know the governments are not deserting us, but we do need more help," a tearful Mr Zhang said.

Huang Huawen , party secretary of Yulei township, whose 5,670 villagers lost much of their farmland to two reservoirs, said township authorities had been overwhelmed in the first days after disaster struck, because they were left to themselves to cope. The township had received 800 tents but would need another 1,000, he said.

Many in Wen county have been dismayed by the scant support. Some blame a gagging order by the province's publicity department on media coverage of the quake's impact on Gansu.

"It's ridiculous to watch Gansu reporters in Sichuan covering the quake while the hardship at their doorsteps is ignored," Mr Huang said.

Gansu Governor Xu Shousheng , who accompanied President Hu Jintao on visits to quake-hit parts of the province at the weekend, said it needed to build 80,000 temporary homes and reconstruction would take at least three years.

Uncertainty over fate of 100 pandas at Gansu reserve
Zhuang Pinghui
May 30, 2008
South China Morning Post

The fate of more than 100 giant pandas at a nature reserve in Gansu remained unclear yesterday, two weeks after the quake struck neighbouring Sichuan.

Not a single panda has been seen by inspectors at the Baishuijiang National Nature Reserve in Gansu's Wen county, the world's biggest panda reserve, according to reserve director Li Shiren.

Mr Li said the animals were easy to find before the May 12 quake.

The county is about 200km from the epicentre, and suffered 111 deaths and more than 1,000 injuries during the massive tremor.

The reserve is one of three nationally designated zones set aside for panda protection and was home to 102 pandas in 2003.

Mr Li said the quake triggered many landslides in the reserve, and most of the roads built last year to monitor the animals were damaged.

Xinhua yesterday quoted the reserve's director, Huang Huali, as saying the condition of the pandas was unclear and the staff could not risk the danger of frequent aftershocks to check on them.

The quake has changed the pandas' habitat and inflicted heavy damage on their main food, bamboo.

The catastrophe may also affect breeding this year because May is the peak mating season, Mr Huang said.

He said the reserve would send staff to rescue the pandas as soon as conditions permitted.

A team of 16 scientists studying the pandas when the quake struck reported that they heard animals panicking as rocks and trees fell during the disaster, Xinhua reported. But Mr Li said the pandas should be safe. He said the inspectors had checked the worst-hit areas and found no signs of injured pandas.

Contrary to a report in the Lanzhou Morning Post yesterday saying inspectors fled the reserve immediately after the quake, Mr Li said staff did not leave until May 18, and seven field stations for the pandas had been operating since the quake.

He said most of the bamboo was fine and should be able to sustain the pandas. But he admitted that the damaged roads meant it would take longer for inspectors to reach the animals' usual stamping grounds.

The inspectors did not reach deep into the reserve as it would take four or five days and be very dangerous because of the frequent aftershocks, he said.

The 223,000-hectare reserve was set up in 1978. It has 10 species under first-class protection, including giant pandas and golden monkeys. It is also home to 42 animals with second-class protection, and six plants under top protection, the report said.

China has more than 1,590 pandas, according to a 2003 survey, and 76 per cent of them are in Sichuan. The Wolong Giant Panda Protection and Research Centre, which is just 30km from the May 12 quake's epicentre, is home to 63 pandas. All but one was safe and accounted for.

I'm not the first person to observe that China's pre-earthquake troubles more or less vanished in the week or two after the disaster in Sichuan. Torch relay? Tibet riots? CNN? Xinjiang protests? The list of issues threatening to disrupt the harmonization of the pre-Olympic atmosphere kept growing bigger, and bigger, and bigger... until, poof!

It's sort of like the U.S. being pulled out of the Great Depression by World War II... no one wanted a World War — or the deaths of tens of millions of people — but we were sure glad to say goodbye to tent camps for the homeless in Central Park.

There are some signs, though, of a return to normalcy in the international back-and-forth between China and the West. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) last week authored an unusually strongly worded resolution calling on China to release Uyghur political prisoners and to preserve Xinjiang's cultural and linguistic heritage:

Etcetera, etcetera, etc.

Sorry for the long image, but there are pages and pages more where that came from if you feel like reading the complete text. Senator Brown also spoke after the resolution was entered into the record, first acknowledging the devastation of the earthquake and then quickly turning to criticism of the Chinese government.

If you ask me, the resolution was introduced at a strange time, unless the Senator was looking to fulfill some responsibility with a minimum of attention. Was this a case of something being buried when no one was looking?

Also, the Senator made a statement of questionable accuracy when he said:

As China rolls out the red carpet to welcome hundreds of thousands of tourists and as Olympic-related media flock to Beijing to watch the events, no one will be allowed to go to Tibet, no one will be allowed to go to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, no one will be allowed to see the hundreds of political prisons, no one will be allowed to visit the areas of China where hundreds of millions live in abject poverty.

The question of tourism in Tibet is still unsettled, but I've never heard of any restrictions on travel to Xinjiang. And areas of the country where "abject poverty" exists? As anyone who's traveled outside of Beijing or Shanghai knows, that's most of China. Last I checked, poor farming and mining villages were still accessible.

I've got to give the Senator credit for one thing: U-Y-G-H-U-R. That's my personally preferred spelling for the major minority ethnic group living in Xinjiang, although U-I-G-H-U-R is more common.

Also, check out Nick Kristof's op-ed piece today from Kashgar, in which he's trailed by the PSB and ends up surprised by the lack of intense antipathy towards the Han felt by most Uyghurs:

“Nobody likes it when the Chinese all move in here,” said a Uighur shop-keeper. “Of course, we’re all upset. But what can we do?”

One young woman offered a different take. “When I was a little kid, my mom would tell me, ‘Don’t wander or the Han Chinese will steal you away. They eat human flesh.’ ” She laughed and added: “But now we see more Han, and we’re not afraid of them. Relations are O.K.”

Some young Uighurs criticized the Beijing Olympics, saying the Games will drain local budgets. But I could have found stronger anti-government sedition on any street corner of Manhattan.

You can read the text of Sen. Brown's speech about Xinjiang below. Please don't take my posting of S. RES. 574 and Brown's remarks as an endorsement of his sentiment. All I want is to provide you with provocative information... and let you argue it out amongst yourselves.
••••

Sen. Sherrod Brown's speech after introduction of S. RES. 574
22 May 2008
Congressional Record

Mr. BROWN: Mr. President, the Chinese people have endured an unspeakable tragedy, as we know, with the loss of tens of thousands in a major earthquake. Those numbers continue to grow. On the radio this morning, I heard it looks like more than 50,000 Chinese people have died in one of the greatest tragedies of the last decade. My prayers are with the people of Sichuan Province and all those brave men and women who are there now providing support as volunteers, especially providing support to the Chinese people in Sichuan Province.

I wish to focus on something else in China. This isn't the Chinese people, it is the actions of a few people at the top of the Chinese Government—actions we must confront. When I say "only a few people at the top," the Chinese Government is called the People's Republic of China for a reason. It is a Communist government, a very top-line hierarchical system, where a few people at the top enjoy so much of the benefits and so much of the power and they wield that so unfairly and immorally and, many times, against so many in their country.

For us to ignore the behavior of the Chinese Government, to dismiss that behavior, to minimize that behavior is a reprehensible act on our part.

In a little more than 3 months, the world will witness one of its great quadrennial events—the summer Olympic Games. The games have been billed as a way for the host, China, to reintroduce itself—a new China, if you will—to the international community. And China has pulled out all the stops: $38 billion in infrastructure improvements, including a brandnew 91,000-seat stadium, 300 miles of new roads, and an entirely new terminal at Beijing's International Airport, all because of the Olympic Games.

What China will not be highlighting is its human rights record. That is because it is abysmally disgraceful.

As China rolls out the red carpet to welcome hundreds of thousands of tourists and as Olympic-related media flock to Beijing to watch the events, no one will be allowed to go to Tibet, no one will be allowed to go to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, no one will be allowed to see the hundreds of political prisons, no one will be allowed to visit the areas of China where hundreds of millions live in abject poverty.

Last year, Amnesty International—a no more respected and fairminded group in the world—said of China:

An increased number of . . . journalists were harassed, detained, and jailed. Thousands of people who pursued their faith outside officially sanctioned churches were subjected to harassment and many to detention and imprisonment. Thousands of people were sentenced to death of executed. Migrants from rural areas were deprived of basic rights.

The Presiding officer, from the State of Rhode Island, has talked passionately about the freedom of the press and journalism in countries where we have the kind of relationship we have with China and how important it is. Others in this body have talked about human rights and labor rights, and now China has violated those values we hold dear and that international organizations that serve all of the world hold so dear.

Beijing will continue to attempt to paint its repressive regime during the Olympics in the best light possible, as we have seen in the last month with the unnerving events in Tibet. The repression in Tibet, a region similar in its treatment by the government as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, is nothing new. For almost 60 years, Tibetans have survived under Beijing repression. Tibet was swallowed up by China in 1950. The Uyghur Autonomous Region was swallowed up by China the year before.

China's policy is straightforward: Declare war on human rights, bring in native Chinese for the best jobs, eradicate the indigenous culture, the language, the spiritual center, disperse the population. It seems to have worked for China's interest every time.

China's policies keep import prices low by allowing inhumane treatment of [S4807] workers, slave wages, and unsafe working conditions have become all too common.

China, the Communist regime, has become China, the world's largest one-company town where workers are interchangeable, replaceable parts and where members of the Communist Party are its shareholders.

The United States as purportedly the world leader in human rights—we talk about exporting democracy, we brag about our values, yet out business is with encouragement and incentives—unbelievably enough, sometimes from our own Government—even though we say we are the world leader in human rights. The United States should not be endorsing in any way the brutal and horrific policies of the Chinese Government. Again, the United States, by our actions by the Government and by business do not seem so interested oftentimes in human rights in China in spite of what we say. We should not be sacrificing our moral compass at the altar of the dollar. We do that way too often.

I met with Rabiya Kadeer, the Uyghur dissident leader and head of the Uyghur American Association. She told me of her time in prison for political advocacy on behalf of her people. She spent 6 long years in prison, arrested in 1999 on her way to a meeting with foreign activists and leaders. She told me of her children who either live in fear or live in prison because of her advocacy on behalf of basic freedoms for the 12 or 13 million Uyghur people. She told me of her exile. She is not allowed to return to her native country.

We need the strength to stand up to rather than apologize for China's brutal regime. This has been the systematic policy of a highly efficient and powerful central government.

The Chinese Uyghurs have long fought for more autonomy from Beijing and greater freedom to practice their Muslim religion.

This is not a new policy. We have seen the same in the Zinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region where ethnic Uyghur people have been systematically relocated and repressed. Their Turkic language is prohibited, their women are placed into forced labor, especially young women taken out of the Autonomous Region to other parts of China, in many cases to be slave labor, forced labor, in other cases to be sex slaves, and their political leaders are jailed. Yet we allow China into the World Health Organization, the World Trade Organization, and made them a preferred trading partner.

Communities across America feel the reverberations of this policy. Not only does it blacken our name as a country when China violates every kind of human rights we care about, but then it affects our country in so many other ways.

We have lost more than 3 million manufacturing jobs across this country since President Bush has been President. Many of these jobs have been eliminated because of government-subsidized imports from China, because of cheating on currency rules, and because of direct off shoring to countries such as China.

China gives their manufacturers that unfair competitive advantage by manipulating its currency and providing massive subsidies to its industry. We know all that. American companies have been complicit by hiring Chinese subcontractors and forcing those subcontractors to continue to cut costs, meaning contaminated vitamins, contaminated pharmaceuticals, and dangerous toxic lead-based paint on toys.

I am submitting a resolution today calling on the Chinese to free the Kadeer children, free the Uyghur political prisoners, and end the political, religious, and ethnic repression in that part of China.

I ask my colleagues to take a look at this resolution, to meet with Ms. Kadeer and to join me in working to bring the atrocities against the Uyghur people to an end. Instead of welcoming China, celebrating China, and trading with China on their terms, as we all talk about the great quadrennial events of the international Olympic Games, we should be helping China's repressed. We should not indulge China its abuses. It dishonors our own values.

Disasters often add grim new terminology to the English lexicon (see: IED, hanging chad, grassy knoll, etc.) and the Wenchuan Earthquake is no different. Actually, it is, because I can't think of any other event that took place in a non-English speaking country that so quickly produced a new English term, like quake lake.

I did a quick search to find the origin of the term in its current usage, and made another surprising discovery... quake lake seems to have spread like a disease from one brilliant mind at Xinhua, quickly attaching itself to respectable journalists across the globe. I even put together a little chart to track the progression:

Now that m'dawg Tania Branigan at The Guardian is pushing quake lake, I'm pretty sure it's gonna stick. Jake Hooker at the New York Times used the term for a second time today.

For all you outdoorsy types, yes, I'm familiar with Quake Lake in Montana, near Yellowstone National Park. The lake was formed in 1959 when a 7.5 magnitude earthquake struck the sparsely populated area, quickly becoming a tourist attraction. No word on whether or not the Xinhua writer had any previous knowledge of that particular lake, but I think the use of the lowercase quake lake as a general term for bodies of water created by seismic activity is new.

I suppose Xinhua has introduced other terms into the English language over the years, but quake lake comes without any political baggage and, better yet, it rhymes. Perhaps it's not as Orwellian as splittists, and it certainly lacks the panache of Cultural Revolution, but I think quake lake is the perfect way to quickly describe what would otherwise be tediously written out as "lakes formed when landslides caused by an earthquake result in the flow of a river being blocked".

A loyal Opposite reader has alerted me to an ABC News story about U.S. military personnel softening-up Uyghur detainees before their interrogation by Chinese visitors at Guantanamo Bay. The news was hidden deep inside a 400+ page report issued this week by the U.S. Department of Justice, detailing the FBI's involvement in the interrogation of detainees in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Gitmo.

I downloaded the report to find the original reference — an extremely difficult task given that the report is only available online in an unsearchable PDF format. I finally found what I was looking for on pg. 183 (which is pg. 226 in the PDF if you end up downloading it yourself). The excerpt here comes from the "Sleep Deprivation or Sleep Disruption" section of a chapter on FBI observations of detainee treatment at Guantanamo Bay:

The scariest thing is that the footnote makes it clear that it was likely Chinese interrogators carrying out the sleep deprivation and sensory abuse of Uyghur detainees, under U.S. custody. At the very least, the Chinese were directing the effort to prepare the detainees for an effective interrogation.

I've heard that the brass over at the Pentagon are looking desperately for a way to get out of Guantanamo Bay... perhaps this is part of a secret plan to slowly turn everything over to the Chinese? I'm sure the PLA could whip that place into shape in a Beijing minute.

The observation of three minutes of silence across China at 2:28pm today was incredibly powerful. Standing silently at work with my Chinese colleagues, the eerie sound of sirens and car horns filling Beijing... I got a tingle up my spine. We were watching CCTV, and the images of rescuers standing at attention forced all of us to reflect on what has, by now, become an operation to retrieve tens of thousands of bodies buried beneath the bricks and concrete.

Later in the day, someone told me that people had been crying on the streets, and that no one had dared to move.

After three minutes of silence, CCTV switched over to live shots from Ti@nanmen Square, where what appeared to be a few thousand people had begun shouting slogans. Their cries were slightly nationalist in tone — long live China! 中国万岁! — but understandably so at a time of great national tragedy.

I couldn't help thinking that it must have been a long time since so many people shouted "long live" anything (or anyone) across from the Gate of Heavenly Peace, fists pumping the air in unison. When would that have been? Seriously... any educated guesses?

Now if they just add some pinyin addresses, almost anyone will be able to make their way around a city where I still somehow get north confused with south.