In late January, Pentagon spokesperson Captain Jeff Davis said that "U.S manned and unmanned aircraft conducted a precision airstrike on January 19 against an Al Qaeda camp in Idlib Province, Syria."

According to Captain Davis, more than 100 Al Qaeda fighters were killed in the airstrike.

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The news was important to China, as many of the fighters killed in the airstrike were Uighurs of the Turkestan Islamic Party.

The Uighurs are fighting under the umbrella of Jabhat Fateh-al-Sham. During the US airstrike, a Uighur Jihadist known as Abu Omar al-Turkistani was killed.

al-Turkistani was one of the four top leaders of the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), which is affiliated with Al Qaeda.

In China, Turkic-speaking Uighurs, living in northwest China and practicing Sunni Islam, have strengthened their campaign for independence since the early 1990s.

The independence of former Central Asian countries such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan partly galvanized an awakening of national identity among Chinese Uighurs.

Central Asia and the Muslim-dominated Xinjiang region of China have a common language and culture.

The Uighurs often use the term "Turkestan" in national liberation and religious movements. The Islamic Movement of Eastern Turkestan, International Committee of Eastern Turkestan and several other Uighur liberation movements have used this term.

All these liberation movements have been officially labeled as terrorist groups, and have been banned in China.

Among the groups, the Turkestan Islamic Party is the biggest financially, militarily, and ideologically. It is also the most influential. The group has become the core of Uighur fighters abroad.

The Syrian civil war and the growing influence of Uighur separatist in the global Jihadist movement have forced China to modify its Middle East foreign policy.

China supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and his allies Russia and Iran.

Tagschina, Syria, Uighurs