Muslims clash with police in China over proposal to demolish mosque

Beijing: China’s government is calling on protesters to withdraw after a crowd clashed with police over plans to demolish a mosque in the country’s southwest as President Xi Jinping’s government tightens controls on religion and society. Have given. Protesters threw water bottles at officers wearing helmets and shields outside the blue-domed Najiaying Mosque in Yuxi, a city in Yunnan province, according to videos on social media.

One punched a police officer’s helmet, but little other violence was shown. The Associated Press confirmed the location of the protest. Videos showing the protest were removed from Chinese social media. Police have asked “criminal suspects” to turn themselves in after Saturday’s incident, saying those who do so could face a lighter sentence.

A police statement vowed ‘zero tolerance’ towards ‘criminal activities disrupting social management’. People answering the phone at police headquarters on Tuesday asked questions from the local government’s publicity office. An employee who called there said the office didn’t have any information.

In 2020, a court ordered that the Najiaying Mosque be demolished after ruling it was built without official permission, according to a document on the court’s website. According to the video, the protesters were Hui, whose ancestors were members of China’s majority Han ethnic group and had converted to Islam. A man in a torn T-shirt was shown wearing handcuffs but it was not clear whether he was in police custody. A caption said that some 30 people were detained but the public pulled some away from the police.

Elsewhere, Xi’s government has demolished mosques or converted them into Chinese-style buildings, removing domes, minarets and other distinctive Muslim features. In the northwest, nearly 1 million members of the mostly Muslim Uyghur minority have been confined to detention centres, according to foreign researchers. The government says they are for on-the-job training and to counter radicalization.

This has prompted complaints that Xi’s government is trying to erase the cultural identity of the Muslim minority. Two female spectators in Yuxi wore Muslim hijabs. The protesters and other spectators were men in T-shirts and trousers or shorts.