China Forces Uighur Muslims to Sell Alcohol
“We have a campaign to weaken religion here and this is part of that campaign,” Adil Sulayman, Aktash village party committee secretary,said on Monday, May 4.
“Since 2012, people have stopped selling alcohol and cigarettes through their businesses. Even those who benefited financially from the practice have given it up because they fear public scorn. That is why [the order was issued].”
The new orders, signed by the Aktash village Party Committee of Laskuy Township, say in part, “all restaurants and supermarkets in our village should place five different brands of alcohol and cigarettes in their shops before [May 1, 2015].”
Shopkeepers were also instructed to promote the products in “eye-catching displays.”
Authorities warned that “anybody who neglects this notice and fails to act will see their shops sealed off, their business suspended, and legal action pursued against them.”
The notice also said the order was handed down from the top ranks of China’s ruling Communist Party.
Sulayman said that over the past years, abstention from alcohol and cigarettes had become common in Aktash and other parts of Laskuy, with some 70-80 percent of people between the ages of 16 and 45 refraining from drinking and smoking.
Though there is no official rule within the Muslim Uighur community against selling the products, doing so was considered “taboo” for religious reasons, he added.
Though there is no direct mention of banning smoking in the Quran, a habit that was not spread during the early days of Islam, many scholars deem it haram (prohibited).
They rely on a hadith by Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) saying that Muslims must abstain from anything harmful.
The case is different for alcohol as Islam takes an uncompromising stand in prohibiting intoxicants.
It forbids Muslims from drinking or even selling alcohol.
The general rule in Islam is that any beverage that gets people intoxicated when taken is unlawful, both in small and large quantities, whether it is alcohol, drugs, fermented raisin drink or something else.
Launched under the pretext of fighting extremism, the new campaigns against Islamic features were regarded as targeting Uighur Muslims’ faith.
“We have more than 60 restaurants and stores in our township and I was told that all of them began stocking alcohol and cigarettes within three days of the announcement, but I didn’t inspect the businesses myself,” Sulayman said.
“I do not know whether people were unhappy about it or not, but I only heard that one person argued and one other agreed to do it after talking to the party secretary,” he said.
“Our village is the key village—we have to implement the ‘Weaken Religion’ campaign effectively … Religious sentiment is increasing and this is affecting stability.”
The law in the predominantly Muslim region came as Beijing intensified its so-called campaign against “religious extremism” that it blames for recent violence.
Uighur Muslims are a Turkish-speaking minority of eight million in the northwestern Xinjiang region.
Xinjiang, which activists call East Turkestan, has been autonomous since 1955 but continues to be the subject of massive security crackdowns by Chinese authorities.
Rights groups accuse Chinese authorities of religious repression against Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang in the name of counter terrorism.
Earlier in 2014, Xinjiang banned the practicing of religion in government buildings, as well as wearing clothes or logos associated with religious extremism.
In August, the northern Xinjiang city of Karamay prohibited young men with beards and women in burqas or hijabs from boarding public buses.
Police have also raided women’s dress shops in the province to confiscate full length robes.
Source: OnIslm.net
