Round of tours, which included drive to promote sense of national unity, continued after President Xi Jinping’s visit to the region this week
Senior officials who travelled to Xinjiang with Xi Jinping have remained in the far western region to focus on religious affairs and the increased use of standard Chinese following the president’s return to Beijing.
On Thursday, during a visit to Korla in central Xinjiang, Wang Huning, the country’s fourth-ranking official, urged Xinjiang – particularly its southern regions – to improve “education in the national standard spoken and written language”, according to state news agency Xinhua.
Southern Xinjiang has historically been a hotbed of ethnic tensions and saw a series of terrorist attacks around a decade ago, which the central authorities said were motivated by religious extremism.
Wang, who chairs the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the political advisory body whose responsibilities include the oversight of ethnic and religious affairs, was among the senior officials who travelled with Xi to mark the 70th anniversary of the establishment of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.
Xi was the first Chinese president to travel to such an event, something Xinhua said underscored the great significance Beijing attached to the region.
The state news agency added that Wang and other senior officials from the central delegation carried out six different inspection tours on Thursday with a focus on Xi’s drive to maintain social stability in the region.
These included State Councillor Shen Yiqin, who used a visit to Karamay, a centre of the oil industry in northern Xinjiang, to urge the local authorities to “consolidate the sense of community of the Chinese nation in a tangible, perceptible and effective manner”.
Shohrat Zakir, vice-chairman of the National People’s Congress, the country’s legislature, led another delegation that visited Urumqi, the regional capital, to look at “school education, grass-roots governance and religious affairs management”.
Zakir is an ethnic Uygur who served as chairman of the region between 2014 and 2021. He was one of the officials sanctioned by the United States over alleged human rights violations.
Beijing has denied accusations it has set up detention camps and used forced labour, saying its policies in the region are designed to counter extremism and terrorism.
Speaking in Urumqi on Thursday morning, Wang said Beijing’s policies on Xinjiang in Xi’s “new era” were “completely correct”.
Earlier this month, Beijing released draft legislation that for the first time formally incorporated the concepts of ethnic unity and the “community of the Chinese nation” into law.
The draft also prohibited any organisation or individual from obstructing a citizen’s right to learn and use Chinese.
On Wednesday, Xi met local officials and senior military officers in Xinjiang and urged them to make every effort to ensure social stability. He also said the region’s development over the past seven decades had been “earth-shaking”.
Xinjiang is one of China’s five autonomous regions that are home to large numbers of ethnic minorities. Its population includes at least 10 million mainly Muslim Uygurs.
