‘Silent Over Uighur Muslims As China Is A Good Friend’: Pakistan PM Imran Khan’s Hypocrisy Analysed

In an interview with the German state broadcaster, Deutsche Welle, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan said that Pakistan stay silent over the persecution of Uighur Muslims in China as it is their ‘good friend’, reports Times Now.

Khan was asked about not being vocal about the Chinese suppression of the Uighur people and to this, Khan replied that China was Pakistan’s great friend and has helped his country during its most difficult times. Pakistan is going through its worst the economic crisis.

Khan was very clear that, any disagreement they have with China is always discussed ‘privately’, not publicly, as these are sensitive issues.

He also said that “the scale of what is happening in India is not comparable to what is supposedly happening to the Uighurs in China.”

This was a direct reference to the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) which was passed by the Indian parliament to give citizenship to minorities persecuted in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan and the abrogation of article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir.

Khan has a history of pontificating when it comes to treatment of Muslims in the west and how Islamophobia is on the rise. In a 50 minutes rambling speech at United Nations General Assembly in 2019, Khan defended the right of Muslim women in the West to don the hijab. “A woman can take off her clothes in [some] countries, but she can’t put on more clothes,” he said. He declared that “there is no such thing as radical Islam,” only “one Islam and that is the Islam we follow of Prophet Muhammad.”

When Khan was asked about the persecution of Uighur Muslims, by journalist, he said he “doesn’t know much.” Over the years China has systematically diluted the Muslim majority by shipping in millions of Han Chinese migrants to Xinjiang province.

In an interview with Richard Haass of Council on Foreign Relations 23 September 2019, Khan said, his country share a “special relationship” with China which stops him from speaking about the Uighurs in public which is a clear indication of his hypocrisy. But in reality Pakistan depends on China for its diplomatic (veto Power at the UN), military and economic support (CPEC and BRI).

Pakistan has never been silent when it comes to Pan-Islamic causes from Palestinian region to Bosnia and Kashmir still remains the corner stone of its foreign policy.

At present over 10 lakh Uighurs are currently imprisoned in so called state-run re-education camps to “wash brains, cleanse hearts, support the right, remove the wrong.”

China also has plans to rewrite Bible and the Quran and as per reports, Beijing plans to translate all classic religious books and new editions will not contain any content that contradicts socialism and paragraphs deemed wrong by censors will be amended or re-translated.

However there is ubiquitous silence on China and its treatment of Uyghur Muslims. In the Abu Dhabi declaration passed by OIC, the Islamic organisation said, “We commend the efforts of the People’s Republic of China in providing care to its Muslim citizens.”

There are reports of Chinese authorities sterilising Uighur Muslim women at internment camps for ethnic and religious minorities, a claim also backed by former detainees.

To keep tabs on Muslims, cutting edge technology is being used like artificial intelligence along with mass surveillance technology to keep a close eye on the Uighurs. This has allowed authorities to identify thousands of Uighurs in just one week for detention or interrogation.

On one hand, Imran Khan lectures the west and India on how Muslims should be treated and how western nations should accommodate Muslim concerns while on the other he and the state of Pakistan remain silent spectator, whilst China forces Uyghur Muslims to eat pork, consume alcohol and punish those who fast during Ramadan.