China uses tourism to smother Xinjiang’s culture

THE AFAQ KHOJA mausoleum in Kashgar is one of the holiest places in Xinjiang, a region in the far west of China. The site is politically charged, too. Several 19th-century uprisings against Chinese rule began with rebels making a pilgrimage to the shrine, and its tomb of Afaq Khoja, a divisive figure revered by some locals as a Sufi Muslim saint, and scorned by others as a traitor. It is beautiful, with stately domes and minarets rendered as exquisite as a jewel box by tiles of green, blue, yellow and brown. To one side lies an ancient cemetery fringed with poplar trees. Its mud and brick tombs were capped with snow when Chaguan visited. As remote as it is lovely, the shrine lies closer to Baghdad than to Beijing.