Muslim Protests Force China to Delay Grand Mosque Demolition
By Nada Hamouda
China’s Weizhou government have decided on Saturday to delay the demolition of a new mosque in northwest China. A decision that came after rare protests that erupted by thousands of Muslims from the ethnic Hui group on Thursday.
According to a notice issued by the Weizhou government on the 3rd of August, the mosque’s management committee had been given a deadline to demolish the building on the grounds that had not been granted the necessary legal paperwork.
The move was most likely a response to the Communist Party’s call to “Sinicise religion“, a policy introduced by President Xi Jinping in 2015. The policy intends to bring religious groups in line with Chinese culture under the absolute authority of the officially atheist party. However, religious groups claim that these moves are shrinking their freedom with Christian churches being shut down, and Tibetan children moving from Buddhist temples to schools.
