Talk:Xinjiang/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

old comments

The following suggestion was moved from the article page:

How'bout dedicating a site to Chinese reforms in that region?

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Olivier (talk • contribs) 15:50, 22 April 2003 (UTC)

XI YU (Western Region):

Why isn't this designation mentioned? This is the official name for this region in all the older Chinese literature, before the Qing Dynasty annexed it.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.42.179.113 (talk) 11:13, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Name

why use this "Xinjiang Uygur Zizhiqu"? is this English or pinyin? how about "Xinjiang Weiwuer Ziziqu"? --Yacht (talk) 08:39, Jul 16, 2004 (UTC)

Some nationalities of China are officially written in variant form of Pinyin (similar to how Shaanxi is officially in a modified Pinyin). Another example: Chaoxian (Koreans) is officially written as Choson. --Menchi 10:52, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

This is actually stated in the official rules for Pinyin orthography, the "Hanyu pinyin fang'an". Unfortunately the rules are not very clear and there are several options, e.g. I think "Uygur" could also be spelled "Uyghur"; the "Fang'an" also has some options for Pinyin spelling that I've never ever actually seen used, such as the use of a ligature for ng or z/c/s with circumflex instead of zh/ch/sh. Babelfisch; August 17th, 2004

Xinjiang in Uyghur

Where are Uyghurian names of Xijiang, why name of xinjiang's head are not in Uyghur, Where İ can find any information about Uyghur alphabet, İs any sites in Uyghur?

Uyghur name of Xinjiang -- no idea. If you know it please add it.

Name of the chairman of Xinjiang -- this is the English Wikipedia, so we don't usually put non-English names. Same goes for, say, the names of Arab or Persian people.

Uyghur alphabet

-- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 20:46, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)

Interestigly, that by Omniglot Uyghur has no letter ə, but in this page uyghur names are used with this symbol... but now Uyghur latin is like pinyin - script for transliterating only, Arabic now is officially in use... strange, that there are no any Uyghur in Wikipedia... -- untifler

That is correct. The translation currently on this page is wrong. I traveled to Xinjiang recently and the Uyghur people there told me that the translation of Xinjiang on this page was wrong. (I made a t-shirt with that on it.) Interestingly enough, they told me that it was perfect Kazakh, which the Kazakhs in the area confirmed for me. -- R'nway [ T C ] 00:16, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Uyghur is officially written in the Arabic script in Xinjiang. And there is a Uyghur Wikipedia, it's just that nobody's working on it. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 15:13, Nov 14, 2004 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Uyghur is not a very commonly used language on the Internet. There don't seem to be many pages in the native writing system, and there are several transkription schemes in use, most of which are based on the modern Turkish alphabet. Also Uyghur Wikipedia is written in one of those systems. I wonder if Uyghurs in Xinjiang can read that at all. "Xinjiang" is a Chinese word, it used to be spelled "Xinjiang" in the official Latin alphabet that was used for Uyghur until the re-introduction of the present Persian-Arabic script. In Uyghur it's شىنجاڭ. The letter ə was part of the Latin alphabet, it's now written ه, like Arabic h, but only the Arabic final and isolated forms are used in that sense, while the Arabic initial form stands for earlier Latin ḥ. The "Latin Alphabet for Uyghur" on the Omniglot site is not the official Latin alphabet, but one system which is now used by exiled Uyghurs on the internet. It's strange that they don't present the official Latin alphabet, but maybe that tells us something about their political agenda. Babelfisch November 15th, 2004

There are three main Uyghur Latin writing systems. One used in Xinjiang in 1969 - 1987, the so-called ULY (as far as know, it is most widely used today) and Turkish-styled Latin script. In these three orthographies the name of the region is Xinⱬang Uyƣur aptonom rayoni, Shinjang Uyghur aptonom rayoni and Şincang Uyğur aptonom rayonı respectively. Don Alessandro 18:10, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

The spelling of Xinjiang in Uyghur script must be wrong. All the letters exept the last one should be linked and the letter now used as a symbol for i is a y. This spelling is all over Wikipedia. Could anyone with access to an Uyghur font please correct this. Nahoj1 (talk) 06:04, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

I have now surfed the official site of the of the local government of Xinjiang and they spell the Xinjiang Uyghur Aptonom Rayoni ﺷﯩﻨﺠﺎﯓ ﺋﯘﻳﻐﯘﺭ ﺋﺎﭘﺘﻮﻧﻮﻡ ﺭﺍﻳﻮﻧﻰ in Uyghur. A change of all the incorrect spellings should be made. Nahoj1 (talk) 07:15, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Category:Pejorative political terms

I added this article to Category:Pejorative political terms because the name Xinjiang, which means "new frontier", is considered extremely offensive and insulting to the Uyghurs and other non-Han local cultures native to the region. (Even official names can be considered grossly pejorative.) - Gilgamesh 08:52, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)

This is an article about the place, not the term. East Turkestan should eventually redirect here. Similarly Northeast China redirects to Manchuria because "Manchuria" is often considered extremely pejorative to Han Chinese living in that region. And it is clear that the article Manchuria should not be in a "pejorative terms" category, because it already covers all possible names for that region. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 14:43, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

In the meantime, thanks for alerting me to this category. Since Xinjiang and East Turkistan remain separate, I'm going to add East Turkistan, because it is a deeply offensive term to most Han Chinese living in or out of Xinjiang. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 16:40, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

Actually, if Xinjiang should belong to this category, what keeps Manchukuo, Republic of Macedonia, Senkaku Islands, Recovered Territories, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, and so forth out? All these carry names that are deeply offensive to at least one group of people involved, in the same way that Xinjiang does. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 16:49, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

I don't object to that. Though if the list grows big, perhaps a new category is needed, such as "disputed political names", perhaps a subcategory of pejorative political terms. - Gilgamesh 06:50, 14 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Probably "disputed" is better than "pejorative". There's a difference between pejorative terms that everyone, including its users, agree are pejorative (such as racist terms); and terms that its users think are perfectly fine and not pejorative at all, but are disputed by others. Certainly blanketing all of these terms as "pejorative" isn't very NPOV. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 17:18, Dec 14, 2004 (UTC)

it should be pointed out that the Uighur people are not necessarily natives of the area but are fairly recent (less than 1300 years) arrivals/ migrants. 86.166.123.12 (talk) 14:50, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Cultural extent

Is the cultural extent of Xinjiang and the political boundary of autonomous region of Xinjiang the same? Like the case of Tibet and Tibet Autonomous Region, and Manchuria. — Instantnood 08:32, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

Depends on how you look at it. There are no significant Uyghur areas outside Xinjiang. But many areas of Xinjiang are predominantly Kazakh, Kyrgyz, or Mongol. -- ran (talk) 13:41, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

Who are the members of the two East Turkistan republics in history? And how far did they control? — Instantnood 13:44, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

[1] It seems to be reasonably NPOV. -- ran (talk) 17:01, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

Thank you. To clarify, I mentioned "the members of.." but I was in fact referring to which peoples, or ethnic groups. Did they (respectively) claim to represent only Uyghurs or represent all non-Han groups in the territories they claimed? What do you mean by IIRC by the way? &mdash Instantnood 17:31, Jan 28 2005, UTC

There ARE significant Uyghur populations in Uzbekistan (at least since 1962), but according to Uzbek census Uzbekistan's population is entirely Uzbek. Furthermore, there's a sizable Uyghur population in Almaty, Kazakhstan, which used to have a center for Uyghur studies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.129.248.103 (talk)

Actually, Uzbekistani census shows that around 80% of Uzbekistan's population are Uzbeks. Plus, contrary to Turkey's, Uzbekistan's goverment is not as corrupt not to allow to state person's ethnicity on the census. So you have no reason to complain.

As for the number of 'Uyghurs' in Uzbekistan, I'm sure it's totally insignificant compared to other ethnic groups in the country.

Census Data

According to Christian Tyler [2] (on page 214), the 2000 census undercounts Han Chinese in Xinjiang by almost three and a half million, omitting policemen, soldiers, and the entire workforce of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. This would make Han Chinese the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang and close to an absolute majority in the province. --MC MasterChef 14:26, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The XPCC article on the Chinese wikipedia states that the XPCC population is indeed counted into the population of Xinjiang. I'll ask the author where his info came from. (And policemen are omitted? I don't understand this statement... do you mean civilian policemen? If a Han Chinese or Uyghur or Kazakh or Hui takes a job as a policeman, he goes off the census?) -- ran (talk) 16:00, Mar 4, 2005 (UTC)

I've been looking around on the government websites of Xinjiang and XPCC, especially the statistics bureaus. Nothing concrete so far, the closest that comes to suggesting that the population of XPCC is included into Xinjiang's population is this: [3]: in a report issued regarding the 2000 census, the total population of 19.25 million is shown as the sum of prefectures, cities, etc., one of which is Shihezi, a city that is completely under the jurisdiction of the XPCC. If stats were counted separately, then Shihezi should not be part of the sum. (The other five cities controlled by the XPCC were all nominally administered by prefectures in 2000 (2 still are today), so there's no way to tell from the chart.)

As I said, this is not "concrete" proof, so I'm still looking. -- ran (talk) 20:15, Mar 4, 2005 (UTC)

You may be right on this - unfortunately I don't speak Chinese myself, and Tyler does not cite a specific source for this claim, so I'm led to assume that he got this from looking at the original Chinese-language census. The quote from his book I was going on before claims that

A census in 2000 showed 7.5 million Han in a population of 19.25 million, or more than 1 in 3. According to the official figures, the Uighurs were the largest group, with 8 million, the Han next, and other minorities — Mongols, Hui, Kazahks, Kyrgyz — made up the rest. But the census did not count as residents the million or so members of the armed forces (soldiers and police), nor the professional advisers, nor — more importantly — the 2.5 million Han Chinese living under the umbrella of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corporation. If these are added, the number of resident Han is nearer to 12 million, making them not only the largest ethnic group but close to becoming an asolute majority in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.

I'm still looking for statements to corroborate this; this speech [4] by Uyghur nationalist Enver Can also makes the claim that the 2000 census explicitly "excludes those from the departments not under the jurisdiction of the regional administration, which mainly involves the People's Liberation Army, the Armed Police Force, the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps", but I'm unable to judge the accuracy of that since I'm unable to read the original Chinese-language census myself. --MC MasterChef 23:48, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

At the end of this source[5], it said the statistics is count on regular local residents, and Chinese sometimes don't change their local residency, or Hukou when they work in another city. In most cities, the police is response for the application of local Hukou. Xingjiang Hukou is one of the least attractive Hukous. --Skyfiler 20:03, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)

Yep, this is one big problem with population censuses in China. -- ran (talk) 21:13, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)

Invitation to join Wikipedia:WikiProject Uyghurs of Western China

Hello, I am looking to organize a WikiProject focusing on creating and expanding articles relating to the Uyghurs, including their history, cultural life (including Islamic practices), politics (separatist movements past and present, overseas disapora, etc), as well as information about the Xinjiang area more broadly. I'm fairly new to Wikipedia so any help interested parties can offer on this undertaking would be much appreciated, thanks! --MC MasterChef 23:28, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)

War

I just read an article comparing Sinkiang to Chechnya, suggesting that China had some sort of civil war or attempted separatist movement in the region. This article doesn't seem to touch on that much, should it say more? (Sam Spade | talk | contributions) 12:10, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

...well, there certainly isn't a war going on right now. Does the article give a time frame for the war? -- ran (talk) 21:56, Apr 8, 2005 (UTC)

I believe this is referring to the bombings in Xinjiang over the past few years that have been attributed to Uyghur militant separatists. Information on this topic should be added to a section of the East Turkistan independence movement article, which Xinjiang should link to in a section on provincial politics. --MC MasterChef 23:34, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Uyghur subdivision names

Most of the Uyghur names for the subdivisions are wrong. Someone just transcribed them back from Pinyin or from another language than Uyghur. Just two examples: wrong: كاراماي (Karamay), correct: قاراماي (K̢aramay); wrong: ھوتان (H̢otan), correct: خوتەن (Hotǝn) – Latin Uyghur spelling (yengi yezik̢) in brackets. It's just not possible to guess the correct Uyghur spelling from the official Pinyin spelling, even if the latter is closer to Uyghur than to Chinese. Babelfisch 01:19, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Are the autonomous prefectures called "wilayat" or "oblast" in Uyghur? The article on the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture has "oblast", and this article has "wilayat". And I've been unable to verify the Uyghur names of "Tumshuke", "Alar", and "Wujiaqu"; I believe that at least "Tumshuke" is not correct, it could be "Tumxuk̢", but definitely not "تۇمشۇكە / Tumxukǝ". Babelfisch 02:23, 26 May 2005 (UTC)

I have no idea... what sources are you using for Uyghur spellings, by the way? I would love to be able to help out and verify some of the names.

Another thing... do you know the exact status of the letter ya ي in Uyghur? It seems that two separate letters are distinguished, one with the two dots and one without; however in some of the names, e.g. Shihanza شیھانزا the ya with dots is used throughout. -- ran (talk) 02:47, May 26, 2005 (UTC)

Spelling! Abstrakt wrongly changed the correct spellings of ق/K̡ and ئۆ/Ɵ to Ķ and Ö. What for? Go brush up your Uyghur before making such changes. And there is a clear difference between ى and ي in modern Uyghur spelling. ى (without dots) is a vowel (i in Yengi yezik̡) and ي (with dots) is a consonant (y in Yengi yezik̡). ى cannot stand at the beginning of a word, it has to be preceded by ئ like all vowels, while ي can stand at the beginning of a word. "Shihanza شیھانزا" is definitely wrong, but I have yet to find out the correct spelling. Babelfisch 01:29, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

ى (no dots) doesn't seem to connect correctly to the next letter for me. I've tried both IE and Firefox, apparently I have one font that connects correctly but adds two dots out of the blue, and another one that doesn't connect at all. What font would you use to view these correctly? -- ran (talk) June 28, 2005 20:50 (UTC)

Actually, I'm not sure which font I Firefox decides to use for which code range. I've installed several Arabic and Unicode fonts. It's difficult to find out. When I copy-paste from Firefox to Word, the font of the Uyghur is displayed as "Mangal", but in fact it isn't. If I copy text into OpenOffice, the font is displayed as "Tahoma", but it isn't Tahoma either. Ridiculous. Arial Unicode MS seems to work, but it's very ugly.

Something else: The spelling of place names should generally follow the official spellings used by the United Nations and given in Zhōngguó dìmínglù 中国地名录 / Gazetteer of China (Beijing, Zhōngguó dìtú chūbǎnshè 中国地图出版社 1997), ISBN 7-5031-1718-4.

And: The two templates Xinjiang and Xinjiang Administrative Divisions are a mess, and they overlap. —Babelfisch 03:40, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Export Import figures confusion

I see under the "economy" section, that the export and import figures in US dollars are listed as 30.47 and 25.88 Is is so riduculously low? or is it in millions? please clarify since i know nothing and came across this possible erroneous statement.--Idleguy 10:02, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

Disputed territories

the article does not explain the includion it in thre category:Disputed territories. AFAIK separatist movements are not included in thes category. Am I missing something else?

If there is a separetist movement in Xinjiang, please add the corresponding article to category:Sovereignty movements. Thank you, mikka (t) 19:15, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

History section should be split

It should. savidan^{(talk) (e@)} 10:20, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

List of administrative divisions of Xinjiang

I've recently been compiling this list, and I've gotten as many names possible from the Uyghur Wikipedia. However, I'm not a Uyghur-speaker, so I might have made mistakes, and there are several blanks for names I can't find. Any help would therefore be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance! -- ran (talk) 04:29, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Western Regions vs. Xinjiang

Please maintain civility and do not accuse good faith edits of vandalism, Ksyrie. As I have told you repeatedly before, I think that a reference to Western Regions is out of place in the first paragraph of an article on Xinjiang. Besides, the source you have attached is a PRC government sponsored site.

Western regions does not cover the same territory as Xinjiang and the term is separated from today by more than 1800 years. Including a reference to Western Regions here gives preference to Chinese historiography of a multi-ethnic region and makes Chinese sovereignty look more coninuous than actually was. We should avoid oblique references like that in a controversial article like this. There is already an article on the history of Xinjiang and a separate article on Western Regions, which gives full justice to episodes of Chinese sovereignty in the area.--Niohe 23:21, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

But I just want to know,why do you keep another turkestan while deleting another name Western Regions which cover the same regions?

What's more the Turkestan and Western Regions cover the same regions.If you want to keep one,you should keep the two,if you want to delete one, your should delete the two.--Ksyrie 02:47, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Look, it is hard to have a discussion if you ignore what I have said and just keep repeating your argument.

I am not talking about Turkestan, I'm talking about East Turkestan. As I have said a number of times already, East Turkestan is a widely used term for the same area as Xinjiang. The Western regions, on the other hand, refers to a larger area supposedly controlled by China 1800 years ago. There is no equivalence here. As to whether Turkestan and Western Regions are synonymous or not, it is up to you to find a credible academic source in support of your argument. I also hope that you can come up with a better source than the Xinhua News Agency.

I cannot accept the idea that once you include East Turkestan in the first paragraph of this article, you also have to include Western Regions. The context, the area in question and timing are entirely different. Xinjiang and East Turkestan are more or less equal terms, and should both be included in the first pararaph for reasons of WP:NPOV. Inclusion of Western Regions, on the other hand, tilts the balance significantly, since it privileges an official Chinese interpretation of the history of the region.--Niohe 03:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

you are very clever to make discard the turkestan just add a eastern or chinese in the front of it.--Ksyrie 04:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Clearly you are not interested in engaging with what I have said. You only need to follow the links above to see the difference between Turkestan and East Turkestan.--Niohe 04:54, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Be of good sense,the East Turkestan cann't exclude the link with Turkestan.Don't tell me there are no direct relation between the two terms.Furthermore,Since the Western Regions once cover the nowadays Xinjiang,why bother to metion it?--Ksyrie 05:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Now you are misrepresenting what I said again. Is that how you avoid dealing with my argument? Just because I make a distinction between Turkestan and East Turkestan doesn't mean that I deny any connection. Where did I say that?--Niohe 05:10, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Xinjiang is often referred to as "East Turkestan". Is it often referred to as "the eastern portions of the Western Regions"? I've never had that impression.—Nat Krause^{(Talk!·What have I done?)} 05:50, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Exactly, and the source Ksyrie keeps posting to this page is not helpful at all and until he provides us with a credible source to prove his claim that this is a common name in current use, we have every right to remove it without being accused of vandalism.--Niohe 12:40, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Why is a PRC government source or Xinhua news agency source apparently unreliable? It is just as reliable as any other governmental site. 195.195.166.31 17:58, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Because it is making statements and interpretations about Chinese history, which are designed to justify status quo in a contested territory. I would not use any government websites to support claims about history.--Niohe 19:32, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

What do you mean by 'contested territory'? 195.195.166.31 10:42, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually I meant disputed territory, or rather, a region where you have competing claims of sovereignty. On one hand you have the current PRC government and on the other various groups that are fighting for independence. The interpretations of Xinjiang/East Turkestan history that these entities put forward are necessarily colored by their political view, and I don't think it is a good a idea to quote them on history.--Niohe 14:52, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi Niohe, personally, I think that since this is an article about Xinjiang AR of the People's Republic of China, you should really use sources that complement what this article is describing. I think that you should argue the independent groups' view of the region's history in another article, if it exists, that is primarily about Xinjiang independence movements. Thank you 195.195.166.31 20:54, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I have no problem with PRC government websites when describing the present situation in the Xinjiang AR, especially when it comes rather mundane factual stuff. But I strongly object to using government-sanctioned websites as reliable sources for history - especially history that goes as far back as the Han or Tang dynasties. I hope you can understand why.--Niohe 21:06, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

My two cents:

Based on my experience of the terms "East Turkestan" and "Xiyu", I can understand why User:Ksyrie is objecting to the use of the term East Turkestan: in contemporary China, that term is used almost exclusively in association with the Xinjiang independence movement; an added dimension of negative connotation results from the association of such independence movements with terrorist acts in China, and terrorist organisations outside.

What's more, the orthodox view in China is that the term "East Turkestan" was invented or revived in the West by Russian imperialists in the 19th Century (partly) in order to justify annexation of the area as part of the greater "Turkestan" which was controlled by Tsarist Russia. Both of these elements combine to make the term heavily imbued with secessionist and generally anti-China flavour in China.

However, the term does not appear to carry the same connotations in English. It is usually regarded as a fairly neutral term, and in any case is a fairly common term. I speculate that this may be because it is easier to pronounce than either "Xinjiang" or "Uighur" or, indeed, Xiyu.

I agree with User:Niohe that the term "Xiyu" or "Western Regions" is far less common in English. It should be noted that "Xiyu" in Chineses is an archaic term. I also agree that Xiyu does not correlate with Xinjiang. In fact, my Chinese dictionary has the following definition for xiyu:

"In the Han Dynasty, those parts of Xinjiang and Central Asia that lie west of Yumen Guan"

Two things need emphasis here. Firstly, the term is archaic. By the time the region was conquered in the Qing Dynasty, it had become Xinjiang, and so it remains to this day. Even in the Qing Dynasty, the word xiyu was used to refer to Xinjiang only in a poetic sense. Secondly, xiyu includes parts of both Xinjiang and Central Asia. It is not the same as Xinjiang.

In any case, it is quite clear that the two terms are not on a par: East Turkestan as a name for Xinjiang is alive and well, as evidenced, for example, by the myriad People's Front of Judea-type movements bearing that name. By contrast Xiyu never corresponded with Xinjiang, and what's more is archaic.

To give an analogy, The Low Countries were once part of Francia, an archaic term which does not correspond with "the Low Countries". Do we include a reference to Francia in the opening to "The Low Countries"? No.

I think the fact that parts of Xinjiang were included in the xiyu deserves a mention somewhere - in the history of Xinjiang, for example. However, it is not nearly notable enough to be at the top, given that the term is so obscure in English.

Finally, the "Western Regions" is not the ideal translation for "Xiyu". Not only is it context-dependent (as in, you have to know you're talking about China), even in the context of China it would be easily mistaken for "西部地区" --Sumple (Talk) 13:10, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

2000 China census

• Does anyone have access to the 2000 China census data for all 56 nationalities, for all of China? Thanks! Ling.Nut 05:45, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Notification

Some sweeping changes have been suggested to the content of the History of Xinjiang. Please see Talk:History_of_Xinjiang#Sweeping_changes. An editor has proposed replacing it with the History of Xinjiang/Sandbox. You feedback would be appreciated. Mkdw^talk 10:34, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

Recent history

The New York Times has reported on a 500-person protest being shut down by Chinese authorities. This should be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.69.118.1 (talk) 23:39, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Non-Native ethnic groups?

I find it most interesting there are some ethnic groups who are not native nor have any history to the region, such as even some Miao/Hmong people here. How did they get there? Were they moved there by PRC programs or what? Le Anh-Huy (talk) 20:53, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, several Manchu-related tribes entered the northwestern part of Xinjiang, near China's border with Kazakhstan, during the 18th century as part of the immigration program set up by the Qing emperors, particularly Qianlong. The Xibo people, who originally came from Manchuria, even has an automonous county. I am not so sure about the Miao-Hmong people, though. The only reasons I can think of are that they either came through cultural exchange program or along with the mass Han-Chinese migration from the 1950's onward. Additionally, a small group of Tatars came to Xinjiang during the Tsarist invasion of the 1800's. Today, many of these people can be found just north of Urumqi, albeit very small in number.

Caucasoid

Is it really necessary to mention that some Uyghurs are fair-skinned and have Caucasoid traits? It sounds a bit like Nazi "science" to me... Luis Rib

Well, they do have such traits. You can phrase it a bit differently if you like. -- [[User:Ran|ran (talk)]] 02:24, Oct 4, 2004 (UTC)

It wouldn't be necessary if we lived in a world in which race (whether considered a real or constructed category) was irrelevant. Unfortunately, that's not the case. The ethnic characteristics of Uyghurs play an important role in discussions of the relationship between Uyghurs and Han Chinese and thus how "Chinese" Xinjiang is or should be. In order to understand the politics of Uyghur/Chinese relations, it's important to know that these characteristics are commonly discussed. Sigrid 20:20, 2 February 2006

(UTC)

Why Caucasoid traits? These traits are probably more Semitic than Caucasoid. 86.166.123.12 (talk) 14:45, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

The more we try to parse this issue the thornier it gets. Read the Caucasian race entry in Wikipedia and see if you can find any way to separate Semitic from Caucasoid. The entire concept of race is in dispute, and regardless of how people ordinarily discuss differences, an encyclopedia ought to try to avoid such uninformed hypotheses in its entries. It might be better to describe, for example, a people as having blue eyes and fair skin and lacking the epicanthic fold, as well as being largely Muslim, than to try to categorize them by "race," and so I'd agree that dropping "Caucasoid" would be smart. After all, much of the European population has at least some Mongolian ancestry, as do Iranians, Turks, Central Asians, and so on - and Uyghurs are certainly included in this distribution regardless of their "Caucasoid traits." And if you go back far enough, I suppose the entire world population has African ancestry. You can see how this can become like an argument about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and has no place in an encyclopedia that is trying to be authoritative and factual.Wlegro (talk) 15:19, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

area

i removed the {{Fact}} tag next to the statement of the province extent to be one 6th of the country area. The area is documented in the infobox, and one can check that of China and do the math (and what i'm talking about here excludes the disputed territories, so...). As concerns the figure for the area, the one here matches my 1972 Petit Larousse, and that of http://www.china.org.cn/e-xibu/2JI/3JI/xinjiang/xinjiang-ban.htm where it also does give the 1/6th proportion.

Jerome Potts 03:59, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

What EXACTLY does this reference to the European countries in this statement mean? "It is a large, sparsely populated area, spanning over 1.6 million km2 (larger than the combined area of all the European states from Germany to Spain), which takes up about one sixth of the country's territory." Exactly what European Countries are we including? Does it include Italy or the Netherlands or Belgium? You get my point, it needs to be more clear. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spirit2112 (talk • contribs) 20:25, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Flag of Xinjiang

The flag linked within the "A succession of peoples" section was linked incorrectly. I have corrected this, adding a thumbnail with a working link to the Xinjiang flag page in the Commons. I have included text under the thumbnail to reflect the usage and political status of the flag in PRC, which I essentially copied from the Flag_of_China page.

As someone who is most definitely not a subject matter expert, I am only seeking to correct the improperly linked image and include a caption that is consistent with those describing flags of other Chinese autonomous regions (i.e., Tibet). I am not sure I agree with the placement of the flag within the article. If this were a state/province in another country, the flag would properly belong in the summary box at the top of the article (e.g., Washington, New_South_Wales, etc.). However, I am sure there are political implications of doing that, and I don't feel I am sufficiently knowledgeable to determine the appropriate usage/placement so I am leaving it where it is, but with a functioning link.

Daqron (talk) 21:05, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

The question is whether the flag for the SAR is an official, state approved, flag or not. Let me take a look...Simonm223 (talk) 16:27, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

No, that is not like the flag of Washington or Ontario. It's fine where it is.Simonm223 (talk) 17:10, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

weasel-tag/continued tensions

section does not indicate clear difference between the East Turkestan Independence Movement and the East Turkestan Islamic Movement.

Actually, I'd like to know exactly what part of the Ethnic Tensions entry is challenged for use of "weasel words." The only part that was clear to me was the first sentence, which I edited in an attempt (possibly unsuccessful) to take them out. Maybe they've already been edited out? Wlegro (talk) 15:29, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I think so, I edited it some, and I think some was done before me too. I left a note for the editor who put the tag there to look and see if they have any more reasons to keep it in.Fuzbaby (talk) 18:55, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the input. I moved the sentence that mentions the East Turkestan Islamic Movement up one paragraph and removed the weasel-tag (I was the one who put it there). Sounds better to me now; I think the issue is resolved, unless you want to check again. Seb az86556 (talk) 21:16, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

East Turkestan Islamic Movement is the name of an actual organization; the "East Turkestan independence movement" is a general idea (like the gay rights movement or civil rights movement). The line is fuzzy in some places, but that is pretty much my understanding of it. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 18:17, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah. Except that the Islamic movement is labeled a terrorist organization by the UN, and Xinhua shortens the Independence movement to ETIM and then mentions Islam... go figure Seb az86556 (talk) 20:57, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

More sources

I just found a wealth of useful academic sources here, at Meshrep.com (a Uyghur forum). They might be cherry-picked, but if they are used properly and put in perspective they could add a lot to the article's coverage of tensions/separatism. I've only looked at the first two so far, though.

Also found this recent article:

• Szadziewski, Henryk. "The discovery of the Uyghurs". openDemocracy.net. Retrieved 11 July 2009.

Not 100% sure about the date; I first found it posted here, and it was either written on 9 July or at least posted then. In any case, it was clearly written after the riots. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 15:18, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Yakub Beg - Tajik or Uzbek?

I notice User:QoziKalon has just changed Yakub Beg's given ethnicity from Tajik to Uzbek and s/he have also changed the reference to the online version of the Encyclopaedia Britannica which clearly states the Yakub Beg was a Tajik. It is certainly not justified to change the reference to the Britannica to read that it claims he was Uzbek. Now, I have no way of telling whether he was originally one or the other, but until someone provides a good reference to the contrary I believe we should use the information from the Britannica. I will, therefore, reverse these changes. Perhaps someone could help out here with another reference please? Sincerely, John Hill (talk) 22:55, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

[[6]] <- not very reliable, but gives a hint as to where the confusion setms from: ethnic Tajik, born in Uzbekistan. Seb az86556 (talk) 00:04, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

This is one of the age-old debates in Central Asia; Tajiks and Uzbeks don't necessarily get along well, and they often all lay claim to the same historical figures. (For what it's worth, Uyghurs and most other groups there are guilty of the same thing....I remember the chapter of my Uyghur textbook where we learned how to describe stuff in the past tense, it was full of sentences about famous 'Uyghur' historical figures who also appear in textbooks for Uzbek, Kazakh, Tajik, etc.) There's also a bit of a nationalistic thing over which is which...I'm no expert, but my general impression is that some people feel Uzbek is just a subgroup of Tajik, and some people feel Tajik is just a subgroup of Uzbek, etc. etc. It's going to be a sticky issue either way. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:34, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

That's weird. I don't know much about the history, but I do know linguistic classification... Tajik is Persian, Uzbek is Turkic... how the heck can they "claim" each other's... heroes? Seb az86556 (talk) 04:44, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Xinjiang vs. XUAR

There have been some disputes over whether to name this article Xinjiang or Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (see, for example, a summary at User talk:Obuli#Xinjiang ref's. I've left a proposal at User talk:Rjanag/Archive6#re-directing "Xinjiang" for a possible way to deal with some of the naming disputes among these articles; any comments or input there would be very welcome. Thanks, rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:37, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Han and non-Han rather than just non-Han

I've edited section 3.3 (a succession of peoples) in the main article on Xinjiang to explicitly state that both Han and non-Han states ruled in this area after the collapse of the Western Jin. The kingdoms of Northern Liang and Western Liang are Han kingdoms. This is also what the wikipedia articles on these two kingdoms explicitly state. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.234.57.7 (talk) 13:11, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

The meaning of "Xinjiang"

Very interesting to see it's emphazied here what does "Xinjiang" mean. As a Chinese, i never thought about that (none of the names of the provinces actually). i thought it was just a "name". so it's quite nice to learn it means "new frontier". ^^ --User:Yacht (talk) 05:39, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

same here, i did realize what the "New Territory" of Canada meant though. 68.145.119.230

Qing government used the name Xinjiang for the place because the Russian tried to occupy the land from the Qing Dynasty. Qing General Zuo Zongtang led the troop to re-capture the land and since then the land is called Xingjian. [Gomeying]

It's actually a horrible name. Not just because the Uighur are not happy with it, it's politically incorrect for the Hans as well, because the region has been part of Han China for well over 2000 years since the Han Dynasty. It is only a "new frontier" for the Manchus. Now China is multicultural and multietnic a better name would be Talimu, named after the "Tarim Basin" just as Qinghai is named after Qinghai Lake or Heilongjiang is name after the Heilong Jiang/Amur River I worked with the Chinese embassy and I've heard there is a notion to create new provinces and rename this Xinjiang as well as Inner Mongolia (again a Manchu name). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Exult (talk • contribs) 02:47, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest and fully support the name Talimu as opposed to the Uighurstan which is put out by the Turkish Uighur separatists. This region has been Chinese long before the nation Turkish ethnicity was created. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Exult (talk • contribs) 02:50, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

(late reply) Too bad the Tarim is not even half of Xinjiang's area. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:59, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Talk page protection

I have protected this talk page temporarily as it is being repeatedly vandalised. If you can't edit this page and want to comment, please use my talk page and I will include on this page. Thanks. GedUK  10:53, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

The page says: "comparable in size to Iran or Western Europe". Western Europe has more than twice the area of Xinjiang. Iran has more or less the same area. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.32.51.82 (talk) 03:50, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

That depends on how you define "Western Europe", of course. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:59, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

2007 Pamir Incident

About the 5 January 2007 Pamir Plateau incident mentioned in the "Ethnic tensions" epigraph, a Spanish journalist, Rafael Poch, published an article after an investigation he personally carried out in the area, and concluded that there didn't exist any "terrorist training camp". Locals explained to him that, as a result of a local protest against the seizure of a coal mine by Han entrepreneurs in the town of Kushirap (Akto district) , one Chinese policeman was killed. As a reprisal, up to 80 Uyghur people were hunted down in the mountains where they had fled to hide, by Chinese army helicopters. Authorities later covered up the event with the story about the terrorist camp. Here is the link (only in Spanish): [7]. I don't have any experience about editing Wikipedia, so perhaps some senior editor could insert this interesting information accoding to the Wikipedia rules. 121.76.93.86 (talk) 02:37, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

So what are we doing with this? It's easy to figure out the gist of it with minimal knowledge of Spanish (at least I think I know what it says)... On the other hand, looks like an op-ed blog on La Vanguardia. Seb az86556 (talk) 05:31, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, the writer is a long-time correspondent for the journal. He was in Russia before, spent 4 years in China and now he is in Germany, always with La Vanguardia. He has covered and investigated many different issues in a very professional manner, and there is the fact that he actually went to Pamir, so I wouldn't consider the article as an op-ed, but rather as an investigative report. The La Vanguardia "diaries" are more like spaces for running longer reports for their website only, rather than simple opinion columns or blogs (or at least Poch used them that way). The only issue is if his sources (local Uighurs) are credible enough, but it could be mentioned in some way like: "Rafael Poch, a Spanish journalist, after investigating the incident and checking with alleged witnesses, claimed that...", or something like that. I think the accusations are grave enough to be included in the article. 121.76.93.86 (talk) 13:57, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I put it in... if someone has doubts, we can always revert it. Seb az86556 (talk) 14:18, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Meaning of Xinjiang

The previous edition is not accurate on the meaning of 'Xinjiang'. In Qing Dynasty of China, Xinjiang (新疆) was a general name for regions separated from previous Chinese Empires and recovered by the Qing, and means 'old territory newly returned' (故土新归). There were several Xinjiang regions during the Qing Dynasty, including 金川新疆 in Sichuan, 改土新疆 in Yunnan, 上游新疆 and 下游新疆 in Guizhou, etc. The Xinjiang referred in this article consisted of 西域新疆 (Xinjiang of the Western Regions) and 新疆回部 (Uyghur Xinjiang) before 19th century. Xinjiang became a specific name for the Western Regions in 1821, when names of other Xinjiang regions were all changed. --MtBell 15:29, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Agreed; 新疆 in Mandarin only means "new frontier/border", not "new territory now returned" or whatever, as suggested in these edits. I'm going to revert the whole thing, because as well as changing that the editor also changed the order of Uyghur and Chinese names in the table with no explanation. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 05:30, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi. I edited the naming section and the table, and put my comments here as what you have read. You agreed with my comments but reverted my edits. It's somewhat confusing. Concerning the list, I reorder the columns and add Mongol, Khazak, Kirgiz names for the Mongol, Khazak and Kirgiz APs. In these APs, these lauguages have the same official status as Chinese and Uygur language, so these names should also been included in the table. Could you recover my edits if you really agree with me? Thank you. --MtBell 20:04, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

The main things I was reverting was the replacement of the following passage

"Xinjiang" literally means "New Frontier" a name given during the Manchu Qing Dynasty in China. It is home to a number of different ethnic groups, many of them Turkic, the largest of which is the Uyghur people.

with

The name Xinjiang, which means 'old territory newly returned', was given by the Qing Dynasty of China in the 18th century.

, and the unexplained switching of columns between Mandarin and Uyghur names in the table. Taking out the Mongol/Khazakh/Khyrghyz names was an accident that came with the revert, and you are free to restore them if you like... although I was somewhat confused at why both the Khazakh and Khyrghyz names were given in Arabic alphabet, since to the best of my knowledge both of those languages are more commonly written in a Cyrillic alphabet. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:05, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

As for the naming of Xinjiang -- apologies for the mix-up, I think I had only read part of your message before responding to it. AFAIK both translations can be correct—"new frontier" is the actual meaning, but the name Xinjiang was also used to refer to all "old territories newly returned" during the early Qing. (i.e., the literal meaning of the word is still the same, but it was used as a name or designation for many other places.) So, if anything, both are worth inclusion—we can give both the literal translation, and mention the historical context (that all 故土新归 regions were known as "Xinjiangs" in the early Qing). rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:14, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

(out) How is this rewrite? The other big question left, of course, is if someone can dig up a better source for this. I won't go as far as to mark the CCTV source with , but it certainly is not the best source to be using for potentially controversial historical claims. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:32, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Suggest that we use the original English spelling, not Pinyin for historical names. The name Sinkiang was used under Manchu rule, not Han rule, and certainly not PRC rule. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.176.193.27 (talk) 17:13, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Caption for Flag-image

I commented out part of the caption which made it sound like the flag was exclusively used by the independence movement; in other words, the phrasing gives the impression that anyone who uses the flag always wants independence. You'd need a darn good source for that. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 05:39, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

The flag is associated with the independence movement (but "associated" doesn't mean exclusively associated), although I don't have a source for that handy. But the association is certainly true (enough that you would not want to wear a shirt with that symbol on it around many Chinese people!), if anyone can dig up a source. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 06:17, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Why use PRC Pinyin for historical name

Suggest that we use the original English spelling, not Pinyin for historical names. The name Sinkiang was used under Manchu rule, not Han rule, and certainly not PRC rule. Changing these old terms creates confusion. Even the Manchus had a formal English name for their empire "Ta Tsing", and pinyin was not even invented at that time. This comment has been posted previously but keeps getting deleted. At a minimum, Wikipedia should leave comments for others to discuss instead of deleting what is not considered PC in the PRC 98.176.193.27 (talk) 04:30, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

this "historical name", which is postcard spelling, is listed somewhere in the article. this issue is the same for: Beijing (formerly Peking), Nanjing (Nanking), Chongqing (Chungking), and many other places. BTW, this Wikipedia has naming conventions for Chinese places (including TW and Singapore).

For Pete's Sale... Since when has Singapore become a Chinese place???! By that logic, France, Spain, Italy, Brazil and dozens of other countries would be considered Roman places. 71.202.24.202 (talk) 14:17, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

A better question to ask is, why isn't the Uyghur romanisation/transliteration used as the article title? possibly because it is remarkably similar in pronunciation to "Xinjiang"? whether this is Uyghur attempts to transliterate Xinjiang to their own language or genuinely their own name can be found in the archive. if not, I don't really know.

What the devil is "PC"? ---华钢琴49 (TALK) 14:50, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

"Suggest that we use the original English spelling, not Pinyin for historical names. The name Sinkiang was used under Manchu rule, not Han rule, and certainly not PRC rule. Changing these old terms creates confusion." I have to rebut this. It doesn't matter whether we use pinyin, wadegiles or what ever other transliteration system because in the Qing Dynasty these transliterations either didn't exist or were only used in foreign texts. In fact, "Sinkiang" was primarily used only in English texts. Other European languages had their own transliteration schemes. The Chinese used traditional Chinese characters and Sinkiang or Xinjiang would have been meaningless to them. I personally think it's much more confusing to laymen users to switch from Sinkiang to Xinjiang so just stick to one. And since pinyin has been in use on the mainland for the last half century, I'd say stick with that. David Straub (talk) 15:24, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

The name of the country was Ta Tsing, not "Qing Dynasty". The English name as officially used by the Manchus can be found in numerous treaties signed with Anglophone countries, including the U.S. and the U.K. The Ta-tsing Empire did have translators and published official translations in English, French, Russian and other languages. If "Sinkiang" was used by the Manchus in English texts, then it would be logical for English Wikipedia to use "Sinkiang". Likewise, if the regime had French translations, French Wikipedia could use those when referring to historical names. The current name of 新疆 in English is indeed "Xinjiang". But the old name, prior to the PRC was not Xinjiang in English. Therefore, the historical names should be preserved and not converted to pinyin if we want to respect history and remain neutral. 98.176.193.27 (talk) 23:25, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

It matches with major encyclopedias such as Britannica.

"The name of the country was Ta Tsing, not "Qing Dynasty". The English name as officially used by the Manchus can be found in numerous treaties signed with Anglophone countries,"

The English name of the country was China, for example, see this treaty between Great Britain and Qing Dynasty. Aldis 1b (talk) 04:28, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

i'm not sure what BS POV you are pushing, but "da Qing" (the chinese name used in the PRC for the qing dynasty, is exactly the same as ta tsing both in pronounciation and in the chinese characters, only different romanization. Wade Giles and Pinyin are different romanizations, but are pronounced exactly the same regardless of different spelling and have the same meanings.Дунгане (talk) 02:27, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

intro

The intro needs to be expanded to give a full summary of the entire content. See WP:LEAD. I gave it a start. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 06:10, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Climate

Zero climate info? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.129.105.67 (talk) 13:31, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

will get to it. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 01:20, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

I have begun with information on basic characteristics as well as Koppen classification. Hope others can fill in holes, too. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 20:29, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

6th century

In subsection Tang Dynasty it reads: "Tang China conducted a series of expeditions against the Turks." I vainly searched earlier subsections to find any revelance to Turks. There were none. If there were no Turks, how could Tang dynasty conduct expeditions against Turks ? It is obvious that a paragraph or a subsection is missing. In fact, Xinjiang had been a part of Turkic Empire in the 6th century. The missing subsection must be added. Nedim Ardoğa (talk) 09:40, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Here is Tujue. Using Turks are very confusing.23:12, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

The last note above is correct - but I thought I shoulod expand it a little. "Turks" in English usually refers to citizens of the country Turkey (the majority of whom are at least partly descended from one branch of the great family of "Turkic" people and speak a "Turkic" language). However, it is sometimes used (rather too loosely, in my opinion), for other Turkic peoples or for people who speak one of the many Turkic languages. That is why you have run into this problem - it is one of the many rather confusing vague names in English (eg. Indians from India and "Indians" from the Americas) and so it is better to specify which particular group is being spoken about, such as Uyghur, Uzbek, etc. Cheers, John Hill (talk) 02:04, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Repeated insertions of violent incidents

BrekekekexKoaxKoax, I take your word as it is... "to demonstrate..." shows that you are here to make a point. Besides that, you have not given much reasoning (what cultural issues?) for inclusion of such material. In addition, I don't like your wording: after reading the Guardian source you gave, it is clear that the revenge attacks were in response to the July 2009 Urumqi riots. As those riots were limited to Urumqi, and not Xinjiang as a whole, we have agreed to avoid mention of them here. I am less opposed to including the second sentence, however, but I see no strong reason to include it. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 23:15, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I imagine this brief mention of events involving 200 deaths and 376 trials are more significant than a thwarted attack and the deaths of sixteen surveillance agents. We have WP:RS, the repeated reverting by User:HXL is whether this is WP:Due. Perhaps a whole additional article is required on this issue 'Persecution of Minorities in Xinjiang Province' perhaps? For now, perhaps brief citation of this article will suffice. BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 23:25, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Firstly, please do not copy an entire section. Provide diffs. That way, it is much easier to examine the changes in question. If you do not do that yourself, I will do it for you. Thanks.

Secondly, please address the concerns I raised. You have already said "is more significant than a thwarted attack". And no, the police are the police. Surveillance agents is your POV.

To all: One of the diffs in question is here. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 23:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Regardless of whether or not the material is appropriate or undue, it's written in completely the wrong way. The Urumchi riots were not directly related to the 2008 attacks and the "revenge attacks by Han Chinese" happened on 7 July 2009 and were "revenge" for the Urumchi riots on 5 July 2009, not for attacks in 2008. Furthermore, the 200 dead figure refers to the official tally of people (mostly Han, but not all) killed in the first day of those riots, not to those killed in the "revenge attacks"; to the best of my knowledge no reliable figures exist for casualties of that event.

Beyond that, both of you guys are edit warring and if you continue you will be blocked per Wikipedia's blocking policy. When it becomes clear that someone disagrees with your edits, you need to limit your discussion to talk, rather than repeatedly reverting one another. rʨanaɢ (talk) 23:34, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

(1) Diffs are insufficient - they do not show to what preexisting material diffs were made. (2) Apart from ad hominem distractions introduced to see where each of us is coming from, though of course this is not affecting either of our edits, your points seem to be (a) not much reasoning to include - please see Guardian article cited, users are not allowed introduced own reasoning - OR/SYNTH; possible reasons may be recent events indicative of tensions and filling out this section of article (b) 'we' are agreed that Urumqi is not relevant to Xinjiang, don't get either of those points - in partic. don't see how capital is irrelevant to province, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 23:38, 18 January 2011 (UTC) Permission to rewrite per User:Rjanag's contributions? BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 23:39, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

The article does not say what you wrote in your edit. We have an extensive article (July 2009 Urumchi riots) with over 200 sources; you may want to check that before citing a single news article, published 2 years after the fact, that barely makes a passing mention of that event.

And no, my comment was not "permission to rewrite". There is still not consensus about whether or not the information is appropriate; I was just pointing out that it was entirely inaccurate. You need to get consensus before adding this stuff to the page again, or you will be temporarily blocked to prevent edit warring. rʨanaɢ (talk) 23:42, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) damn it

(1). Yes, a diff by definition shows what the pre-existing material was (don't understand the rest of your sentence).

(2a). This does not involve OR yet. The article very clearly says that the attack was in response to July 2009, not the pre-Olympics sortie.

(2b). Urumqi is but a small part of the vast "new frontier". It would be like listing who the state senator for my zip code is at the state article. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 23:43, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Guess the 2009 Urumqi riot article should be linked in the 1960-present section, should it not? (2a) have requested permission to emend - though can just link to this other article (2b) presumably inclusion of thwarted attack is like listing failed senators for your 'zip' code, whatever that is. Presumably 376 trials is of relevance? BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 23:49, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Big numbers do not prove notability or relevance.

And by the way, I don't see why you think your edit "demonstrates" that there is "persecution of minorities" in Xinjiang; nothing in that reference specifically says that, and in any case it is only a news article. rʨanaɢ (talk) 23:53, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) again That entire response is confusing to me. The comparison with the state senators was a matter of scope. To put it clear, here is an analogy... Urumqi:Xinjiang::my state senator:Commonwealth of Virginia.

and no, it was 376 people, not 376 trials. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 23:54, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Grr edit conflict...

(1) Interesting observation, but please elucidate consequences for article (2) Re 'by the way' - does that impact whether Guardian article warrants inclusion? (3) Is this tacit agreement for link to 2009 riots in history section?

Presumably not even the Chinese Government would round up all its opponents up and try them as one? BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 23:59, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) no it is not tacit agreement. There needs to be an effect on Xinjiang as a whole, not just its capital, for the July 2009 riots to be counted in. The point about the PRC Gov't is speculation and less than relevant in this discussion. I was merely correcting you on the unit (person vs. trial) used. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:01, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

While this may be a fallacious argument, how is the attack on half a dozen surveillance agents relevant to Xinjiang as a whole? How is a thwarted attack relevant to Xinjiang as a whole? Why omit the link? cui bono? BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

2008 Xinjiang attack is a re-direct, while July 2009 Xinjiang riots is not. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

"How is a thwarted attack relevant to Xinjiang as a whole?" If you are referring to the article's prurient coverage of violent incidents at the expense of all other local history, and the shockingly stereotypical characterization of this whole province as a "focal point of ethnic tensions", then I agree; it's not related at all. Frankly, this article's treatment of Xinjiang history is as offensive as having the history section of the article on California exclusively cover racial riots in California. Xinjiang may not make it in the Western newspapers unless buses are being burned, but this article should not be so narrow in its focus. Quigley (talk) 00:25, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Entirely agree with User:Quigley; my interest is in Bezeklik and its paintings, so hope to work on the cultural history section in due course. BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:34, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Please place your responses in the proper place... see talk page guidelines.

Evidently, that has not been the case. But that is a matter not pertinent to this issue at hand. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:42, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Quigley, as I agree strongly with your concern (neither Tibet article has such wording appear so prominently in the intro), I have attempted to address it by moving that sentence out of the intro and into the modern history section. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:42, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Great, shall we add that link as well as the Urumqi riots? Thanks, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:11, 19 January 2011 (UTC) Looks like those riots spread out, anyway, per article: The official news agency, Xinhua, reported that police believed agitators were trying to organise more unrest in other areas in Xinjiang, such as Aksu and the Yili Prefecture.[64] Violent protests also sprang up in Kashgar, in southwestern Xinjiang, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I will know immediately if you create the re-direct. And the round of violence that summer began in Urumqi. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:17, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Rather than letting this discussion continue its descent into absurdity, why don't you just post (below) a draft of the edit you intend on making, and then people can discuss specifically the merits of that edit, rather than speculating about stuff that nobody knows. rʨanaɢ (talk) 00:20, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Good suggestion, just tried but edit conflict... So you're happy if I add 'other instances of tension in the province include the 2008 Xinjiang attack, the 2009 Urumqi riots, and unrest in 2010 that led to the trials of 376 people'. Also, why have you removed the relevant section of the article from this discussion, so that other users have to look at the history to see what's under discussion? BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:24, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

No. It was I who removed it. See the history of this talk page for why. No to the July 2009 riots for the reasons I have given above. Your proposal sounds like compromise merely for the sake of compromise. it is not a clear edit. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 00:27, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

But does not my edit of 00:13 show the reasoning is not valid? All agreed with this amendment? Thanks, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:59, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

No. You certainly do not have my approval. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 04:41, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Now, Dear User:HXML, it may be helpful to others to understand why your 'approval' is withheld - perhaps you might care to rationalize, say, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 11:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Now, Dear Brek, it may be helpful to others if you fully read what others have written and if you improve your absurdly awful English. I have already explained my reasoning enough. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 15:07, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Dire need for User:Rjanag's (or others') mediation... BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 19:40, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

As far as I have seen he is clearly not in favour of your addition. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 20:13, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Brekekekex, I still don't quite understand what you want to add. Make your desired edits at this sandbox and then post the diffs here for review. rʨanaɢ (talk) 21:36, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Ok, have finished playing in my sandpit, BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:06, 20 January 2011 (UTC) Here are the diffs:

In recent years Xinjiang has been a focal point of ethnic and other tensions. After a number of student demonstrations in the 1980s, the Baren Township riot of April 1990 led to more than 50 deaths. 1997 saw the Ghulja Incident and Urumqi bus bombs, while police continue to battle with religious separatists from the East Turkestan Islamic Movement. Recent incidents include the 2007 Xinjiang raid, a thwarted suicide bombing attempt on a China Southern Airlines flight, and the 2008 Xinjiang attack which resulted in the deaths of sixteen police officers four days before the Beijing Olympics. Further incidents include the July 2009 Ürümqi riots, in which 200 died, the September 2009 Xinjiang unrest, and the 2010 Aksu bombing that led to the trials of 376 people.

Previous:

In the 1980s there was a smattering of student demonstrations culminating in the Baren Township riot in April 1990, which led to more than 50 deaths. In 1997, the Ghulja Incident and Urumqi bus bombs resulted in nine deaths each. Police continue to battle with religious separatists from the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, as in the 2007 Xinjiang raid. A suicide bombing attempt on a China Southern Airlines flight in Xinjiang was thwarted in March 2008, but militants succeeded in killing 16 police officers four days before the Beijing Olympics.

That's not a diff. rʨanaɢ (talk) 00:27, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Is this it? [8] BrekekekexKoaxKoax (talk) 00:54, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Breke, please do not lie in your edit summaries, "1960-present: pasting content discussed on discussion page with voiced/tacit agreement of all but a User:HXML, providing WikiLinks to a number of related articles, and reducing narrative". When have Quigley and Rjanag ever expressed approval of your edits? Rjanag only copied the text from the stable (i.e., before this dispute occurred) version to your sandbox and did nothing else. No other posts on your talk other than warnings, either. Most importantly, there has not been a single comment by Rjanag on your edits in the sandbox, other than "that's not a diff". In any case, I am growing tired of edit warring with you. --HXL's Roundtable, and Record 23:43, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

While it is true that no one ever commented in favor of adding this material and Brekekekex should have waited for consensus before editing, in this case I don't think the edit is really any better or worse than the old version, so I don't see any point in reverting. But Brekekekex, in the future, refrain from editing passages in which you are involved in an edit war until there has been explicit consensus at the talk page. Don't assume you can read other editors' minds and gauge "tacit" approval in areas where you yourself are a party in the dispute. rʨanaɢ (talk) 00:30, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Demographic changes

Regarding this disputed edit: since there is disagreement over whether or not to include this addition, the standard procedure is to revert the article to the way it was before the edit, and have a discussion here over whether or not to include the addition. It should not be restored until after consensus is established here. Please review our policy on edit warring. To prevent further edit warring, I have protected the article from editing for 1 week, which should be enough time to discuss the issue here.

My opinion is that this addition is unnecessary because the immigration issue is already discussed in detail in the Xinjiang#Demographics section, and there is no need to add another section about the same thing using a self-made graph to push a particular viewpoint. Other editors are welcome to add their opinions here as well. rʨanaɢ (talk) 19:52, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Additionally, Xinjiang is older than the People's Republic of China, so the years of the graph are arbitrary, and (from the user's other comments) designed to disrupt Wikipedia to make a political point. I've already expressed my concern with the overwhelming emphasis on ethnicity on the "Demographics" section, relative to other demographic factors, but that factor unfortunately seems to be entrenched because of politics. This article is definitely not lacking in ethnic minutiae, and the scope of this article as "Xinjiang" and not "ethnic composition of XUAR" desperately needs reassertion. Quigley (talk) 20:02, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Nonetheless, one could reasonably argue for the inclusion of similar chart (better quality is warranted here), though not in a separate section, and definitely not with the slanted comment that was given. (oh wow, thanks for linking to a diff by me... didn't even see that) Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 20:56, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Somehow, I knew you'd find your way here ;) But seriously, where would you see a similar chart of the ethnic change of the United States except on a racist website (oh noes, white people are becoming a minority!) ? That chart ignores the complex realities of the internal diversity of the peoples collectively called "Han" and "Uyghur", who came (and returned) to their homes for different reasons at different times. It doesn't increase the readers' understanding; it erases nuance and radicalizes. Quigley (talk) 21:06, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Incidentally,^{(look for reason here)} I would welcome such charts for the decimation of Native Americans. But of course, white people wouldn't want to see that :) Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 21:11, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Incidentally, I would welcome such charts for the decimation of the pre-Uyghur inhabitants of Xinjiang, which includes Han people. But of course, Uyghur nationalists wouldn't want to see that :) Quigley (talk) 21:13, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

• sigh* whatever. I don't insist on any of that. I just wanted to point out that the addition wasn't completely groundless. So let's just wait what the original poster has anything to say (if anything at all). If not, just leave it. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 21:16, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

If it isn't groundless, then on what grounds should the chart be included? Because if it is included, I would love to include similar charts on the articles for the other Chinese minority regions. I don't mean this in a POINTy way, because lazy journalists regularly (and falsely) say that there was some massive Han influx in those places after 1950, where reliable records show that the Han were a overwhelming majority before the PRC (Inner Mongolia), or remained very small even after the PRC (Tibet). Of course, there is tremendous resistance to including proper statistics on the Tibet articles, with editors arguing that Chinese records are unreliable and seek to hide some secret Han majority. So can we air out all of the logical reasons for inclusion now, or is it just politics? Quigley (talk) 21:24, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Look, I don't insist on the PRC's founding-date if such statistics are brought up, as I am sure there were changes before that. I would generally find it interesting to have a chart on these changes (however far back they may go) and then people can look at it and think whatever they like. You certainly have a point that picking the specific date of the PRC's founding is probably part of some agenda. Nonetheless, I would be interested in a graphical representation of the changes; pick a start-date of your liking. At least from my position, this is not meant to be a communist-bashing exercise or whatever. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 21:31, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

"Uyghurs" are not native to the Ili region in Xinjiang. Before the destruction of the Mongol Zunghars, "Uyghurs" did not live in the region, and were not called Uyghurs. the Qing authorities moved Turki people from the Tarim basin into Ili, where they were called Taranchi. After the Dungan Revolt, they again settled many Taranchis in the region. The "Uyghur" population was inflated during the Qing dynasty as a result of government policy.ΔΥΝΓΑΝΕ (talk) 22:21, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the beginning date is arbitrary: it shows population shifts in Xinjiang during the modern era, which begins ca. 1950. Among other things, the graph shows accurately that non-Han ethnic groups increased in numbers during this period. Quigley is quite right that other autonomous regions in the PRC did not experience the same dramatic shifts that Xinjiang did in the 50s and 60s, which is all the more reason to give some clear information about what did happen. We do have a potential problem with the reliability of the statistics, but we have to make do with what we have as best we can.

"Of course, there is tremendous resistance to including proper statistics on the Tibet articles" sounds quite hyperbolic to me. Which Tibet articles are we referring to here? I often refer to Wikipedia for official statistics on the population of Tibetan areas. That said, the reliability of each piece of data must be judged individually, and the idea that official demographic statistics for Tibet are questionable is hardly a fringe idea or bias. Andrew M. Fischer has a very balanced article on Tibetan demographics in Authenticating Tibet (pp. 144-151) in which he concludes that exile complaints on this issue are greatly exaggerated, but he says of the census: "The Han census count in the TAR was obviously an underestimate" and "This number is treated with incredulity by most observers."

I have some misgivings about using the Xinjiang data for the same reasons, but, on the other hand, I've yet to hear any specific criticisms of the Xinjiang census. Like I said, we have to do the best we can with the data we have.

I also think that it would be more meaningful from a historical perspective to treat northern and southern Xinjiang separately, since, as Dungane points out, there was no stable, long-term Uyghur majority to begin with in the north, and they are still the majority in the south (as far as we can tell from official numbers). However, the government that compiles the official statistics since 1950 certainly treats Xinjiang as a single unit.—Greg Pandatshang (talk) 15:18, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Comments from the graph's creator

Dear Friends,

It is unfortunate that not reality but narrow Chinese nationalist view presented here. The data in this graph is taken from Chinese statistics. Do you want to say Chinese official statistics also fake??

It is known that Uyghur’s were absolute majority until 1950; this is the fact, if you do not want to accept that it is personal issue, not academic issue. It is estimated about 200-300 thousand Han Chinese lived in Xinjiang before 1999.

If you think there is Chinese population in Xinjiang before 1759 show us the evidence, I am eager to see that.

Cheers --Hungarian new (talk) 01:49, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

"gencocide" of Han Chinese in Xinjiang, if you believe there is any evidence, please share with us also!

Cheers again!--Hungarian new (talk) 01:54, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

"chinese population in xinjiang" has been for 2,000 years. U heard of the Gaochang country Xinjiang? Gaochang country been ruled by chinese and whole population is chinese, for hundreds of years after collapse the end of Han dynasty. the king was chinese. the It ruled by chinese up 2 Tang dynasty, when Tibetan Empire take over it 789, after China go through civil war Anshi Rebellion Uyghur Khaganate conquered it 803. This is well known in historian study iny in silk road and tang dynasty. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zhan Tuo (talk • contribs) 03:24, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

I think we're dealing with differing definitions of "Chinese" here (?) Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 03:45, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Hungarian new, when no one said that the data in the graph was incorrect. And there are no claims in this article about "genocide of Han Chinese". The argument was never about the accuracy of the information or the historical facts of Han people in Xinjiang; the reasons presented above for not including the graph were editorial, and you have responded to none of them. Please take a moment to actually read the discussion above instead of just making nationalistic attacks. rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:59, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Proposed move/rename

Maybe we should rename/move/redirect the article to Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. This is the official title given to the entity and the incomplete name Xinjiang seems misleading. Any opinions? Thank you. Stokastik (talk) 03:02, 11 September 2011 (UTC).

I disagree. Whenever possible, Wikipedia uses common names rather than official names. Compare other articles on Chinese regions (e.g. Tibet, Guangxi, Ningxia); none of them use the full name as the article title. rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:04, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Tibet is a bad example, since it is not about a political/administrative territory and we have a separate Tibet Autonomous Region article. I agree with Rjanag that we should use the simpler title when it is unambiguous. That seems to be the pattern with most top-level subnational entities for many countries, even though lower-level entities might use longer names. I notice that all of the Tibetan autonomous areas outside of the TAR have titles like Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture or Tenzhu Tibetan Autonomous County, but those are not top-level divisions.—Greg Pandatshang (talk) 07:30, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

For what it's worth, there was an interesting discussion a few years back about reorganizing the Xinjiang-related articles. Nothing ever came of it, but a summary is here if anyone's interested. rʨanaɢ (talk) 12:27, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Xinjiang's uyghur population growth from the 1960s to 1982

This information should be added to the article

"In the mid-1960s there were about 4 million Uygurs and 500 000 Kazaks. By 1982 the Uygur population had grown to almost 6 million and Kazaks numbered over 900000. The total population of Xinjiang in 1987 exceeded 14 million"

http://books.google.ca/books?id=K3XdB5o4VFAC&pg=PT99&dq="In+the+mid-1960s,+there+were+about+4+million+Uygurs+and+500+0 00+Kazaks.+By+1982,+the+Uygur+population+had+gr+ow n+to+almost+6+million,+and+Kazaks+numbered+ove+r+9 00000.+The+total+population+of+Xinjiang+in+1987++e xceeded+14+million"&hl=en&sa=X&ei=tlAvT9vlH6qg0QWorNnlDQ&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q="In the mid-1960s%2C there were about 4 million Uygurs and 500 000 Kazaks. By 1982%2C the Uygur population had gr own to almost 6 million%2C and Kazaks numbered ove r 900000. The total population of Xinjiang in 1987exceeded 14 million"&f=false

Page 102

Title China's Geography: Globalization and the Dynamics of Political, Economic, and Social Change Changing Regions in a Global Context: New Perspectives in Regional Geography Series Authors Gregory Veeck, Clifton W. Pannell, Christopher J. Smith, Youqin Huang Edition 2, revised Publisher Rowman & Littlefield, 2011 ISBN 0742567842, 9780742567849 Length 400 pages

Kuoofra (talk) 20:56, 12 October 2012 (UTC)

http://books.google.ca/books?id=cF4lMj8skvoC&pg=PA63&lpg=PA63&dq=Xinjiang+1+million+people&source=bl&ots=qYCLlIedji&sig=x5tRssf8ykqJvzD1diWYbTkslYQ&hl=en&sa=X&ei=D1t6UPbALMf40gGe34Ao&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Xinjiang%201%20million%20people&f=false

http://books.google.ca/books?id=GXj4a3gss8wC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=Xinjiang+1+million+people&source=bl&ots=Up_SgxmcTw&sig=cRpOK9QHJRLijBO03h_wU-fZLxY&hl=en&sa=X&ei=D1t6UPbALMf40gGe34Ao&ved=0CEAQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=Xinjiang%201%20million%20people&f=false

http://books.google.ca/books?id=wEih57-GWQQC&pg=PA85&lpg=PA85&dq=Xinjiang+1+million+people&source=bl&ots=12WJ7bRvX9&sig=fFqaGeCtIa_CvxkYb6PYSZWIBJA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=1Vt6UK2TO4m70QHkgIHQBQ&ved=0CFQQ6AEwBjgK#v=onepage&q=Xinjiang%201%20million%20people&f=false

Kuoofra (talk) 08:01, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Non uyghur minorities

Some non uyghur minorities objected to the Chariman of Xinjiang being chosen on the basis that he is a uyghur

http://books.google.com/books?id=qz3vdkxBt4AC&pg=PA184#v=onepage&q&f=false

Rajmaan (talk) 16:37, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

political entities that ruled or controlled parts of Xinjiang

I removed "influenced" from "ruled, controlled, or influenced by" because it would make the criteria too broad and the list too long (at the present time, for example, many countries "influence" Xinjiang in some way). Reading the History of Xinjiang article and looking at some of the linked articles, I found that nearly all of the listed states did in fact rule or control a portion of Xinjiang. The one exception was Xianbei state. Though I'm not entirely certain, it seems like "Eastern Mongolia and Northern Manchuria" does not include Xinjiang, so I removed Xianbei state from the list. The Tibetan Empire wrested Xinjiang from the Tang Dynasty, Moghulistan replaced the Chagatai Khanate, and the Yarkent Khanate has its own section in the History of Xinjiang article (as the State of Yarkand), so I have added those to the list. All this information comes from Wikipedia, so if someone has a reliable source with information that would alter the list, feel free to adjust accordingly.--Wikimedes (talk) 19:43, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

The Xinjiang was a part of the Xianbei, Rouran and Northern Yuan!. Ancientsteppe (talk) 10:58, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Agree on the Rouran Khaganate. I can't verify the other two, but I don't know much about it and have limited sources, so you might be right there also.--Wikimedes (talk) 18:25, 29 July 2013 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Xinjiang/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

This article does not have much actual text, and still needs a lot of expansion beyond pictures and tables. --Danaman5 02:08, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Last edited at 02:08, 13 January 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 16:06, 1 May 2016 (UTC)