New violence erupted in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang Province, today as Chinese police shot dead two Uighur men. Despite an attempted return to normalcy, tensions in Xinjiang - and in China more generally - remain high. Jonathan Fenby has an excellent opinion piece in today's FT in which he explains how these recent events in Xinjiang highlight the nature of (and problems with) China's governing structure. Certainly worth a read.
The NYTimes also had a great graphic over the weekend showing the parts of China with significant minority populations. Minority here refers to one of the 55 recognized groups other than Han Chinese. The linked graphic enables you to view regions in China that have from 10 to 70% minority populations. The image below highlights the counties where at least half of the population is something other than Han:
While the graphic is somewhat misleading in that the Western provinces are very lightly populated compared to the highly populous eastern Han region, it nevertheless provides a very good visual of the control issues faced by China's central government. The very issues that Fenby does so well to outline in his OpEd piece, and the ones that stand to challenge the CCP's 'One China' ideology.