China says Uighurs being sold as ISIL's 'cannon fodder' in Turkey

Uighurs from China's Xinjiang are being given Turkish identity papers in Southeast Asia by Turkish diplomats and then taken to Turkey where some are sold to fight for groups like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as "cannon fodder," a senior Chinese official said. 

Beijing says the Turkic language-speaking Uighur minority are firstly Chinese nationals, and those who flee China should be returned to their home region in the far west of the country bordering central Asia. 

"Turkish embassies in Southeast Asia will give them proof of identity," Tong Bishan, division chief of the Ministry of Public Security's Criminal Investigation Department, told a small group of foreign reporters in Beijing on July 11. 

"They are obviously Chinese but they will give them identities as Turkish nationals." 

The accusation is likely to further anger Ankara, already alarmed by the return of more than 100 Uighurs to China from Thailand this week. 

Some Turks see themselves as sharing a common cultural and religious heritage with their Uighur "brothers". 

Hundreds, possibly thousands, of Uighurs keen to escape unrest in China's western Xinjiang region, have travelled clandestinely via Southeast Asia to Turkey. China is home to about 20 million Muslims spread across its vast territory, only a portion of whom are Uighurs.

Tong said that hundreds of Uighurs had been given documents by Turkish diplomats, especially in Kuala Lumpur, and then allowed into Turkey. 

Neither the Turkish Foreign Ministry nor the Turkish embassy in Kuala Lumpur were able to immediately provide comment. 

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