有趣的歷史。介紹鄂圖曼帝國的蘇丹,派遣特使到中國,試圖與中國穆斯林建立友好關係。之後在北京建立伊斯蘭大學。這可以從當時清國與鄂圖曼帝國同時在西方半殖民與殖民的背景理解。
20 January 2010 /MESUT
ÇEVIKALP/OSMAN EROL
An
Austrian steamship which left İstanbul silently on April 28, 1901, stopping
briefly in both İzmir and Alexandria, and then passed through the Red Sea and
headed towards the Far East, wound up spurring all of the various Western
agents and envoys in the region into action.
Before
the steamship had even reached China, the Western envoys in Beijing were all
sending encrypted messages back to their capitals: “The
‘tricky Sultan’ in İstanbul has started up new maneuvers to try and pull the
Muslims in China onto his side. A nine-person delegation is arriving in China.”
When, after
a long and difficult journey, the Ottoman delegation
reached China, there were celebrations in the region. Crowds of Chinese Muslims rushed to the Shanghai port to see
the steamship. And not only Western newspapers, but in fact the world
press turned over generous amounts of space to the coverage of this event at
the time. Though the Chinese leadership greeted the
visiting Ottoman delegation warmly, the Western colonial powers present in
China at the time were not as relaxed. There was great curiosity about
what the real reason behind the visit to China by Enver
Pasha -- sent by Sultan Abdülhamid II himself -- really was. This being
the case, the pasha and his accompanying delegation
(composed of his wife, two clerks, two scholars, two soldiers, and various
manservants) spent the next four months of their visit basically surrounded by
a circle of Western agents and envoys. In his fluent French, and through
his influential style, Enver Pasha told both the
Chinese Muslims and the various foreign envoys that he was in China to deliver
messages of peace from Sultan Abdülhamid II. The Westerners, however, were not
inclined to believe these assurances.