{"id":1669,"date":"2020-05-03T20:41:44","date_gmt":"2020-05-03T11:41:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/?p=1669"},"modified":"2020-05-03T20:41:44","modified_gmt":"2020-05-03T11:41:44","slug":"teachers-from-chinas-interior-encouraged-to-settle-in-xinjiang-as-part-of-aid-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/2020\/05\/03\/teachers-from-chinas-interior-encouraged-to-settle-in-xinjiang-as-part-of-aid-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Teachers From China\u2019s Interior Encouraged to Settle in Xinjiang as Part of \u2018Aid\u2019 Program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>2020-04-15<\/strong><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/uyghur\/teachers-04152020184759.html?fbclid=IwAR2C4ZbeptmfR9m-ol_kJdFQnCprEieOoQ4wHGF1kB61tqNYZaKjXJAQf3Q\">https:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/uyghur\/teachers-04152020184759.html?fbclid=IwAR2C4ZbeptmfR9m-ol_kJdFQnCprEieOoQ4wHGF1kB61tqNYZaKjXJAQf3Q<\/a><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Teachers from China\u2019s interior are being encouraged to move to and settle in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) to provide \u201caid\u201d for residents, according to sources, but members of the Uyghur exile community say the program is another measure aimed at \u201ccolonizing\u201d their homeland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The \u201cPlan to Aid Tibet and Xinjiang with 10,000 Teachers\u201d was envisioned by Chinese President Xi Jinping and the Central Party Committee as a \u201clong-term solution for the stability\u201d of the two regions, according to the official China Education Net, and has been promoted\u2014along with other policies in the region\u2014as a form of \u201cpoverty alleviation\u201d to improve the lives of the local population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At its launch in 2018, 4,000 teachers were sent to the XUAR from China\u2019s interior, while in 2019, another 3,180 were shipped to the western region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While contract periods initially lasted between 18 months and two years, authorities have recently begun offering a plethora of subsidies to entice teachers to remain in the XUAR beyond the terms of their agreements, sources have told RFA\u2019s Uyghur Service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Beijing shuttered schools across China in February to control the spread of the coronavirus, but as measures to combat the outbreak appear to have yielded results, authorities reopened them in the XUAR on March 23.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Around the reopening, state media published several reports of teachers being sent to the XUAR as part of the Plan, including an article published on the Dahe website on April 3, which said 249 teachers from Henan province were assigned to elementary and middle schools at the 13<sup>th<\/sup>&nbsp;Division of the quasi-military Xinjiang Production and Construction Corp (XPCC) in&nbsp;Kumul (in Chinese, Hami) prefecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All of the teachers had applied for the \u201cXinjiang Aid\u201d program that is part of a cooperative agreement between authorities in Henan and the XUAR, the article said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The official Tianshan.net website recently published an article stating that 170 teachers from Shanghai had been assigned to 15 elementary and middle schools in four counties of Kashgar (Kashi) prefecture\u2014Yarkand (Shache), Poskam (Zepu), Kargilik (Yecheng), and Maralbeshi (Bachu)\u2014while only 15 teachers in the same program were sent to Tibet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And on March 16, the Xinjiang People\u2019s Radio Station broadcast a report that 80 Han teachers from Guizhou province had returned to Xinjiang for work at schools in Hotan (Hetian) prefecture two days earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Teachers were required to return to the XUAR prior to March 15, the report said, and authorities arranged special transport for them on airplanes and buses so that they\u2014along with other educators from outside of the region\u2014could return to work \u201con time,\u201d ahead of the reopening of schools a week later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to the broadcast, Wang Jiwen, vice secretary of the Hotan Prefectural Party Education Committee guaranteed that he would oversee the return of 18,800 teachers from outside of the XUAR.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Enticing teachers to stay<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>RFA\u2019s Uyghur Service recently spoke with a Han Chinese employee of the Work Office for Teachers in the Xinjiang Aid Program, under the Ministry of Education in Atush (Atushi) city,&nbsp;in the XUAR\u2019s Kizilsu Kirghiz (Kezileisu Keerkezi) Autonomous Prefecture, who said that Hebei is the partner province providing teaching \u201caid\u201d to her region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s been in place here for one year, since 2019,\u201d she said, speaking on condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The employee said that last year, eight teachers were sent from Hebei to Atush to teach at two middle schools and several elementary schools in the city, and that all had expressed a desire to stay there after then end of their contracts, which she called a \u201csign of the program\u2019s success.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>RFA also spoke with a cadre from the 13<sup>th<\/sup>&nbsp;Division of the XPCC, or \u201cbingtuan,\u201d in Kumul, who confirmed that the program \u201cis for people from [China\u2019s] interior.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While he said that the program does not have any restrictions on ethnicity, the vast majority of people from non-autonomous regions in other parts of China are Han Chinese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The cadre also declined to be named but claimed to be in charge of placing teachers from Henan and Hebei as part of the Xinjiang Aid program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Contracts for teachers are usually between 18 months and two years, he said, but there is a plan to entice teachers to permanently stay in the region after the contracts end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cApplications for the program are still open,\u201d he said, adding that his group \u201cmake[s] determinations based on the different places that need people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIf teachers who\u2019ve come here after earning college degrees want to stay on after their contracts have ended, we\u2019ll help them do the paperwork to update their status and move their household registration here. Whether to stay or leave is entirely up to the applicants themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2018Colonization\u2019 of the region<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Uyghurs in exile say that undermining traditional Uyghur education is a key part of Beijing\u2019s policy of cultural assimilation in the XUAR, which officials believe will make members of the ethnic group more loyal to the ruling Communist Party and solidify the central government\u2019s control of the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The \u201cXinjiang Aid\u201d program has been put into place as the XPCC has overseen the extending of various subsidies to Han Chinese residents of other parts of China to relocate in droves to the XUAR, including offering them homes and plots of land with generous tax abatements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Meanwhile, authorities in the XUAR are believed to have detained up to 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities accused of&nbsp;accused of harboring \u201cstrong religious views\u201d and \u201cpolitically incorrect\u201d ideas in a vast network of internment camps since April 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Memet Tohti, a Canadian representative of the Munich-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC), told RFA that authorities in the XUAR are seeking \u201cto make our people Han by means of assimilation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe colonization that is currently occurring on our home soil\u2014the government is achieving it by putting its own people onto our land,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis is the final step for them to make this land their own \u2026 It\u2019s an issue of eliminating an entire ethnic group.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>Reported by Gulchehre Hoja for RFA\u2019s Uyghur Service. Translated by Elise Anderson. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>2020-04-15https:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/uyghur\/teachers-04152020184759.html?fbclid=IwAR2C4ZbeptmfR9m-ol_kJdFQnCprEieOoQ4wHGF1kB61tqNYZaKjXJAQf3Q Teachers from China\u2019s interior are being encouraged to move to and settle in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) to provide \u201caid\u201d for residents, &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1670,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,4],"class_list":["post-1669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-ethnic-cleansing-crime-against-humanity-genocide","tag-human-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1669"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1669\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1671,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1669\/revisions\/1671"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yuzb.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}