Tel Aviv, Feb 23 (SocialNews.XYZ) While Turkey has emerged as one of the most vocal international advocates on Gaza in recent years, its silence on the abuses of Uyghurs by Chinese authorities is deafening – a striking irony that cannot be ignored, a report highlighted on Monday.
It added that in China’s Xinjiang region, Uyghurs - the Turkic-Muslim people whom Turkish President Erdogan once called victims of “genocide” - endure mass detention, forced labour, pervasive surveillance, restrictions on religious practice, family separation, and policies aimed at erasing cultural and linguistic identity.
According to the Israeli think tank 'Moshe Dayan Centre for Middle Eastern and African Studies' (MDC), despite the dire situation of the Uyghurs, Turkish decision makers do not raise the Uyghur issue publicly as they do with the Palestinian case. Turkish non-governmental organisations largely overlook the plight of the Uyghurs, while mainstream media outlets fail to cover the issue, leaving Uyghur voices unheard within Turkey.
“The answer to this paradox lies in what Gaza offers Turkey, and the Uyghur issue does not. Gaza is a stage where Turkey can claim regional influence and regime legitimacy. Owing to political ties with Hamas that date back to at least 2006, Turkey has emerged over the years as a primary external patron of the organisation. This role solidified as Hamas faced increasing isolation following the 2023 Gaza war and as the regional proxy network of Iran began to weaken,” the report detailed.
“By providing Hamas with room to manoeuvre throughout the war and acting as a negotiation facilitator to protect the interests of Hamas during hostage-prisoner swaps while hosting released members, Turkey has secured a seat at the table to shape the post war administration of Gaza,” it mentioned.
The report emphasised that since forging strategic partnership ties with China in 2010, Erdogan has omitted the Uyghurs issue from his public statements despite increasingly presenting Turkey as the “political and cultural leader” of the Turkic world.
Citing International reports and human rights investigations, it noted that the eleven million Uyghurs in Xinjiang have faced decades of systematic oppression by Beijing.
The report further said, “By positioning himself as the ‘defender of the oppressed’ in the case of Gaza, President Erdogan has secured significant geopolitical leverage and reinforced a powerful domestic narrative of Muslim leadership. However, this mantle of guardianship falters at the borders of Xinjiang, where the cost of principle clashes with the necessity of Chinese capital. If Ankara continues to allow economic survival to dictate its conscience, its claim of leadership in the Turkic and Muslim worlds will remain incomplete and insincere.”
Source: IANS
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