Taiwan film fest to show Uighur documentary
Last Updated: Saturday, September 5, 2009 | 11:36 AM ET
CBC News
World Uighur Congress head Rebiya Kadeer, shown here in July, is the subject of the documentary, The 10 Conditions of Love. (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/Associated Press)A film festival in Taiwan has announced it will be screening a documentary about the exiled leader of China's Uighur minority, in a move that's bound to upset the Chinese government.
Organizers at the Kaohsiung Film Festival said Saturday that The 10 Conditions of Love, about World Uighur Congress head Rebiya Kadeer, will be shown during the festival, which runs Oct. 16-29.
Festival spokesperson Liu Hsiu-ying said the film fits perfectly with the event's "people power" theme, adding that "we hope people will not see it from a political angle."
It's unlikely Chinese authorities will take that attitude.
China has labelled Kadeer, based out of Washington D.C., a criminal and blames her for sparking protests in its Xinjiang region in July in which more than 1,600 people were injured and at least 200 others died.
As well, Chinese officials had objected to the inclusion of the film at the Melbourne International Film Festival in August.
The government of China formally grieved Australia's government over Kadeer's visit to the country as part of that festival, while several Chinese directors boycotted the festival as well.
Chinese bloggers and citizens living around the world began a campaign that crashed the festival's website.
The inclusion of the documentary at Kaohsiung, Taiwan's second largest city, is particularly sensitive for China as its mayor, Chen Chu, is a member of the island's pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party.
That opposition party had also invited Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, to Taiwan earlier this week to comfort victims of Typhoon Morakot,
Although the Dalai Lama had deemed his visit "non-political," Chinese leaders were not amused.
