Uyghur Research Institute

The international counter-terrorism seminar held in Gulja, East Turkistan, on August 4, 2026, is considered one of the Chinese government's most significant diplomatic steps to legitimize its policies in the region on the international stage and neutralize Western criticisms¹. This meeting is part of Beijing's strategy to comprehensively integrate its repressive mechanisms in East Turkistan into the social system and market them as a guarantee of peaceful development under the guise of "governance by law."

Representatives from 24 countries, including Russia and the United Arab Emirates, as well as 3 regional organizations like the African Union, attended the forum¹. Co-organized by the "World Muslim Communities Council" (WMCC), the event handed China a highly valuable card of legitimacy in the Islamic world. Through this collaboration, Beijing repackaged its policies of religious suppression in East Turkistan as "countering extremism."

According to analyses, the fundamental strategic goal of the meeting is not to convince the West, but to attract "Global South" countries, Central Asian republics, and Muslim-majority nations to China's security model. In doing so, China is forging a new alliance capable of countering Western human rights pressures and altering the global security discourse.

This article systematically highlights the political and diplomatic signals hidden behind the Gulja forum, the geographical and ethnic motives behind choosing the city of Gulja, the political analysis of the seven key propaganda concepts presented at the meeting, and the structural contradictions between China's narrative system and the reports of international human rights observers and the UN.

Simultaneously, the article analyzes international structural similarities, showing that the weaponization of counter-terrorism mechanisms to stifle civic space is not limited to China. It compares the Indian government's repressive policies in Kashmir and the Kenyan government's counter-terrorism tactics targeting Muslim communities, shedding light on how states use the word "terrorism" to silence social movements.

Background

The Gulja International Counter-Terrorism Seminar was held at a time that coincided with a series of sensitive domestic and international political shifts for China. From an internal political perspective, the large-scale penal camps and systematic arrest waves implemented in East Turkistan since 2017 have now entered a "normalized" new phase. Having brought the society under full surveillance, the Beijing government is now in urgent need of demonstrating to the world that the region has been pacified and that life is continuing "normally."

On the international front, following the 2022 report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Western criticisms and economic sanctions against China intensified². China is currently relying on the majority voting power in the UN to neutralize Western sanction initiatives. Furthermore, ongoing global conflicts and rising terrorist incidents have created a favorable geopolitical environment for China to present its high-pressure control system as a successful "security model."

The choice of the year 2026 is also no coincidence. This year marks a planned milestone for internationalizing the "Global Security Initiative" (GSI) proposed by Xi Jinping through practical examples. To counter the Western security system, China aimed to showcase East Turkistan—a region it claims to have "fully resolved the pressure of terrorism"—as the first live exhibition site of the GSI.

In previous years, counter-terrorism meetings were mostly held in political and economic centers like Beijing or Shanghai, focusing primarily on theoretical and policy-oriented discussions. However, the 2026 Gulja meeting, by being held directly in a local region viewed as the epicenter of events, illustrates a shift from theory to a "live demonstration" phase. This step is a clear indication that China's international image defense has transitioned from a passive state to an active offensive.

Therefore, this forum is a process where Beijing presents its policies not merely as an internal affair to be managed, but as a major "contribution" to the global counter-terrorism arena on the international agenda. Through this seminar, China attempted to conceal the characteristics of its traditional state terror and promote it as a legitimate measure compliant with international cooperation.

The Political Significance of Choosing Gulja

The Chinese government's decision to select the city of Gulja (Ili) as the meeting venue, rather than Beijing, Urumqi, or Kashgar further south, carries profound strategic signals. Gulja is a unique geographical region located in the northwest of East Turkistan, inhabited by diverse ethnic groups, and sharing a direct border with Kazakhstan. Historically, Gulja has played a vital and central role in the political activities, uprisings, and the formation of national consciousness among Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples.

From a geographical perspective, Gulja is one of the most important trade ports opening to Central Asia and a hub of the "Belt and Road" initiative. The choice of this city is precisely to demonstrate China's ability to fully control its border regions. By allowing foreign guests to witness the development along the border and the fluidity of trade traffic firsthand, they are led to feel that "there are no security issues left in the region."

In terms of ethnic composition and diversity, Uyghurs live alongside Kazakhs, Hui, and other ethnic groups in Gulja. In its political propaganda, China sought to use Gulca to counter Western claims of "ethnic genocide." During the meeting, multi-ethnic cultural festivals, traditional dances, and songs were showcased, depicting the region as a paradise of multi-ethnic reconciliation and harmony.

From the perspective of border security, a direct signal was sent to Central Asian republics through Gulja. By demonstrating its control over the border region to foreign ambassadors while stationed in Gulja, China conveyed the message to Central Asian countries: "I am the most reliable partner capable of preventing terrorism from spilling outward." This type of border political stability aims to further strengthen neighboring countries' economic and political dependence on China.

While Western nations have targeted policies in the southern regions of East Turkistan for years, China attempted to shift the international focus by selecting Gulja in the north. Through this choice, China symbolically tried to prove to the international community that every part of the region is developed and that no suppression exists. The Gulja meeting served as a kind of political seal declaring Beijing's total victory over East Turkistan.

On another note, the selection of Gulja is part of a plan to culturally connect the Central Asian geography with China. By holding the meeting here, China completely diluted the region's original Islamic identity, transforming it and presenting it under a state-approved "tourism and entertainment code." This tactic is one of Beijing's greatest strategies of showcasing a colorful facade against Western narratives.

China's Primary Strategic Objectives

The primary strategic objective of the Gulja meeting is to repair the international image damage caused by China's high-pressure policies in East Turkistan and to create international legitimacy for Beijing's security policy. As a direct method of responding to the human rights criticisms from the US and Western countries, China is attempting to redefine the mutual relationship between development and security.

Through this meeting, China is well aware that it can convince the "Global South" countries, rather than the West. Therefore, Beijing concentrated all its efforts on drawing the African Union, the Arab world, and Central Asian republics to its side. Because these countries themselves are in dire need of security measures to suppress domestic opposition groups and ethnic movements, they view China's counter-terrorism and total control model as an ideal opportunity.

The meeting shaped a series of formal rejections against the West's "double standards" tactics. Chinese representatives at the meeting accused Western countries of "exploiting the theme of terrorism for their own geopolitical interests." By portraying itself as a proponent of "genuine multilateral counter-terrorism," Beijing attempted to categorize Western human rights attacks as politically motivated actions.

Another crucial objective is redefining the concept of human rights. In China's official speeches at the meeting, it was loudly emphasized that the most fundamental human rights are the "right to subsistence" and the "right to development," and that without security, these rights have no value. This narrative systematically aims to reject the human rights understanding based on Western individual freedoms and political rights.

Strategically speaking, while China legitimizes its repressive mechanisms in East Turkistan domestically to silently stifle civic space, it concurrently markets the "effectiveness" of this mechanism through international seminars. The meeting is a key plan for the Chinese state apparatus to impose its own security rules on other countries and build a non-Western security sphere.

The meeting also explicitly mentioned that international counter-terrorism cooperation must be based on respecting the sovereignty of states. The political backdrop of this statement is: States must not interfere in each other's internal affairs and should not weaponize the human rights issue. This signal is a political shield used by China to preemptively block any international investigation into its policies in East Turkistan.

Beijing also used this forum to justify its policy of completely silencing the East Turkistan society. All statements at the meeting attempted to portray the systematic uprisings in the region entirely as foreign-instigated terrorist plots. Through this tactic, China turned all self-defense movements of the local peoples into an illegal criminal code before the international community.

Ultimately, China's core strategic goal at the meeting is to remove itself from the West's global human rights evaluation system and to establish a new "development and security" alliance under its leadership. The Gulja meeting was promoted as the first victorious step of this new world order. This forum is a clear practical example of how state terror can be preserved in the global system under the shield of development.

Official Narrative System and Propaganda Analysis

The Chinese government's official statements and news texts at the Gulja meeting are built upon a set of systematic narratives. This narrative system is intentionally designed to obscure Western criticisms and present the state's repressive policies wrapped in legal and cultural codes. In the official speeches at the meeting, several key concepts were constantly repeated:

1. "Terrorism" (恐怖主义): This concept was one of the most frequently repeated words in the meeting's reports. In China's political communication, this word served to portray all surveillance and suppressive measures implemented by the state apparatus as an "essential fundamental weapon for national security." The threat of terrorism was depicted as a source constantly originating from the outside, posing a common threat to all nations.

2. "Extremism" (极端化): This is one of the grandest narratives masking China's cultural and religious prohibition policies in East Turkistan. At the meeting, actions banning religious activities and traditions were embellished as "preventing religious extremism." This concept served to equate any peaceful political demands or cultural uniqueness of the society with criminal "extremism," warranting an immediate crackdown.

3. "Governance by Law" (法治反恐): This narrative was emphasized as the most central theme by the autonomous region authorities and Pan Xi³. This term was used to demonstrate that, contrary to Western criticisms of "extrajudicial internment" and "arbitrary detention" in East Turkistan, all political punishments and suppressive actions are handled according to specific articles of the Chinese Constitution and Criminal Law. Through this narrative, China attempts to present its state apparatus as a fully legal and highly responsible institution.

4. "Coordinating Development and Security" (统筹发展和安全): This concept serves to justify the massive economic construction and forced labor policies currently being implemented by the Chinese government in the region. Meeting statements emphasized that without development there is no security, portraying all high-tech surveillance mechanisms in the region as a kind of "important guarantee for economic prosperity."

5. "Double Standards" (双重标准): Chinese representatives used this phrase to criticize the arbitrariness of Western countries in countering terrorism. They argued that the West's silent support for terrorist activities in other countries while labeling China's legal measures in East Turkistan as "suppression" is a political bias. This narrative is a rhetorical weapon launched to destroy the moral foundation of Western human rights criticisms.

6. "International Cooperation" (国际合作): This concept materialized through the participation of foreign delegates at the meeting. Stressing the necessity of a new global security cooperation, China promoted the establishment of a counter-terrorism network led by itself, outside of Western-controlled platforms like the UN. This narrative aims to strengthen non-Western multilateral cooperation internationally.

7. "Human Rights Protection" (人权保障): At the meeting, this word was completely stripped of its Western context of peaceful individual freedom and replaced with collective narratives such as the "right to subsistence" and "right to development." Chinese representatives stated that the counter-terrorism measures themselves are exactly the act of protecting the right to life of the citizens in East Turkistan and providing the greatest guarantee for human rights. Through this, China is attempting to alter the standards of the international human rights discourse system.

Overall, these seven major narrative systems are the fundamental structural pieces in the official propaganda of the Gulja meeting. These words are tightly interconnected, with their core purpose being to mitigate the reality of state terror and introduce the systematic suppression in East Turkistan as a "normal state governance mechanism" to the international community. China's effort proves that its strategic propaganda mindset is highly systematized.

Diplomatic and International Significance

The Gulja meeting is considered a critical turning point in China's path to expanding its diplomatic space and alleviating international pressure. Judging by the composition of the participating countries—representatives from 24 countries and regional organizations including Russia, the UAE, and the African Union—it shows that China has built a strong alliance in international diplomacy. By standing outside the Western human rights system, these nations are forming a new pole centered around security cooperation with Beijing.

The most extraordinary diplomatic success of the meeting is that it was co-organized by the "World Muslim Communities Council" (WMCC), headquartered in the UAE¹. The chairman of the council, Dr. Ali Rashid Al Nuaimi, delivered a speech at the meeting, highly praising China's counter-terrorism experiences in East Turkistan. This cooperation paved the way for China to further consolidate its relations with the Muslim world and politically neutralize the West's "anti-Islam" criticisms.

From a diplomatic standpoint, gaining the recognition of Islamic countries is the most valuable card for Beijing. When representatives of the Arab world and Muslim countries observe the situation in East Turkistan and acknowledge China's policies not as "destroying Muslims, but as a measure to save them from terrorism," all Western criticisms inherently lose their value. This collaboration is precisely the biggest diplomatic game Beijing has played to bolster its Islamic legitimacy internationally.

The meeting was also directly linked to the "Belt and Road Initiative" (BRI) and the "Global Security Initiative" (GSI) proposed by Xi Jinping. China presented the internal stability of East Turkistan as the guarantee for all developments along the BRI route. A message was systematically presented to the participating countries: "If East Turkistan is stable, the trade routes reaching you will be secure." This tactic aims to integrate security with economic interests.

The significance of this meeting was also particularly high within the framework of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). China is attempting to align the counter-terrorism measures of SCO member states with its model in East Turkistan. The Gulja meeting served as a forum to officially introduce and market Beijing's political and technological control tools to the member countries of the organization. Through this, China further solidified its security leadership position in the region.

In conclusion, the diplomatic significance of the Gulja meeting is that China has completed transforming its passive position on human rights issues into a security leadership role in the non-Western world. The meeting turned into a grand parade demonstrating Beijing's new partnerships in the global security system. Such a diplomatic victory will pave the way for Beijing to continue its high-pressure policies in East Turkistan with even greater audacity in the future.

Comparative Assessment

There are immense structural contradictions between the Chinese government's justificatory narratives at the Gulja meeting and the assessments of independent international observers, UN human rights bodies, and human rights organizations. While China's official speeches declared that "governance by law in counter-terrorism" has been implemented in East Turkistan and human rights are guaranteed to the highest degree, independent international investigations shed light on an entirely different reality.

For instance, the 2022 special report on East Turkistan by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) indicates that China's legal system for counter-terrorism and de-extremification is deeply vague and open-ended, making it easily usable to criminalize any peaceful political and religious activities². The report also highlighted the scale of systematic internments and arbitrary deprivation of liberty in the region, specifically emphasizing that these may constitute "crimes against humanity."

Reports from organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch also strike at China's "governance by law" narrative through meticulous analysis⁴. According to these organizations, China's counter-terrorism system is intentionally designed to stifle political dissent and aims to completely eradicate the ethnic identity, cultural roots, and basic religious practices of Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples. This structural suppression mechanism manages every stratum of society through high-tech surveillance.

Independent international researchers and theorists of "Critical Terrorism Studies" have systematically proven how states weaponize the discourse of terrorism to conceal their own state terror⁵. Based on the theoretical frameworks of scholars like Richard Jackson, Ruth Blakeley, and Eric Herring, powerful states exaggerate the terrorist threat to create a special "state power shield" that stifles civic space and justifies ethno-repressive policies⁵. The event termed the Gulja meeting is precisely the most typical practical example of this theoretical fact.

Such structural repressive practices are not limited to China alone. In other sensitive regions of the world, one can observe how powerful states weaponize the terrorism framework to silence opposition groups and eliminate mass movements. For example, the oppressive policies employed by the Indian government in the Kashmir region share very strong similarities with the Chinese signals at the Gulja meeting.

Relying on the archaic and draconian "Unlawful Activities Prevention Act" (UAPA), the Indian government employed tactics of detaining activists, journalists, and human rights defenders in Kashmir without trial and categorizing them under criminal codes as terrorist acts⁶. For example, the arrest of prominent human rights defender Khurram Parvez under UAPA provisions is typical evidence of India suffocating independent civil society space under the pretext of terrorism. Similarly, India systematically silenced civil society activities by restricting the foreign financial sources of human rights organizations through the "Foreign Contribution Regulation Act" (FCRA)⁶.

Another structural similarity can be seen in Kenya's counter-terrorism policies. Under the pretext of fighting the "Al-Shabaab" terrorist group, the Kenyan government implemented high-pressure policies targeting the domestic local Muslim population and activists⁷. Kenya's 2012 "Prevention of Terrorism Act" (POTA) granted the state apparatus unrestrained power to arrest individuals, surveil society, and stifle basic civil rights under vague terrorist pretexts. This policy played a role in marginalizing local Muslim communities and silencing their political voices.

In conclusion, the narratives promoted by China at the Gulja meeting—"security is the guarantee of development, human rights are protected"—are entirely a theatrical performance played out to cover up the reality of state terror. International human rights reports and structural similarities in other countries (India and Kenya) prove that states use the term terrorism to elevate their policies of ethnic pressure and suppression to a level of international legality. The Gulja meeting is the first live manifestation in the global system of states covertly suffocating civic space under the pretext of terrorism.

Future Impact and Conclusion

The Gulja International Counter-Terrorism Seminar provides extremely delicate signals regarding the future direction of the Chinese government's policies in East Turkistan. In the future, Beijing will further stabilize its high-pressure surveillance and systematic control system, transforming it into an invisible, daily social management mechanism. All political punishments in the region will now be completely concealed outside the walls of the camps, underneath the "trump card of law."

This situation will have a strong impact on the structure of international debate regarding the East Turkistan issue. Due to China's new narrative tactics, the Uyghur issue will turn into a polarized struggle internationally. On one hand, while Western countries continue their criticisms from the standpoint of human rights and ethnic suppression, on the other hand, the "Global South" countries will collectively support China's development and security narratives, turning into a shield that protects Beijing.

The future direction of China's security diplomacy aims to further strengthen the role of non-Western platforms internationally. By making other countries accept its counter-terrorism model, Beijing attempts to alter the fundamental rules of the global security system. This situation will completely dilute the value of human rights internationally, alarmingly expanding the boundaries of state power in suppressing their citizens.

The signals of silence embedded in the official statements at the meeting indicate that Beijing has successfully completed its forced assimilation operations in East Turkistan. Phrases such as "transformation through education," which appeared in official statements in previous years, have now completely disappeared. This silence indicates that the Chinese government has completed the "transformation" operation of the first phase and transitioned to the "full stabilization and systematic integration" of the second phase.

The overall conclusion is that the 2026 Gulja meeting is a clear proof of how China can turn its domestic violent policies into a propaganda tool internationally under the pretext of development and law. The tactic of states using the word terrorism to stifle civil society has become a "new normal" in the global system through the Gulja meeting. If the international community fails to create a new set of investigative tools against such structural repression mechanisms in the future, civic space will noticeably shrink worldwide.

1. 2026年反恐国际研讨会在新疆伊犁举行, 新华网, August 2026.

2. OHCHR Assessment of human rights concerns in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, People's Republic of China, United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), August 2022.

3. 潘曦：新疆坚持法治反恐 兼顾反恐成效与人权保障, 中新网·新疆, August 2026.

4. Weaponizing counter-terrorism, Amnesty International / Human Rights Watch Reports, 2022-2025.

5. Contemporary State Terrorism: Theory and Practice, Richard Jackson, Lee Jarvis, Jeroen Gunning, Marie Breen-Smyth, Routledge, 2011/2022.

6. India: Stop Abusing Counterterrorism Regulations, Amnesty International, November 3, 2023.

7. KENYA'S FIGHT AGAINST GLOBAL TERRORISM IN THE CONTEXT OF CRITICAL THEORY: THE CASE OF AL-SHABAAB, Duygu Kutlu, Siyasal Bilgiler Fakültesi Dergisi, X/1, 2025.