Dedicated guards who safeguard Xinjiang’s mountainous border
Print Edition
Members of Mamet Nurobolesen’s family in the far west of China has kept their promise to protect their motherland for four generations.
Living under Muztagata, a mountain close to China’s northwest frontier in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, 17 people from this Kirgiz herding family have held the role of civilian border patrol guards over the past seven decades to fulfill their oath to defend the country’s borderline.
Polmo Dyulyut, Mamet’s grandfather, joined one of the country’s first civilian border patrols in 1950s.
“As long as we are here, the border will never be moved by even a millimeter. We will keep it safe,” vowed Polmo. That oath has been passed down from the generations due to the Kirgiz tradition of following the commands of elders.
The 4,100-meter-high plateau is so scarcely populated that when the People’s Republic of China was founded in 1949 there were only a handful of households in Muzukoro, a mountain pass in Kizilsu Kirgiz Autonomous Prefecture that leads to Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
To better safeguard the prefecture’s 1,133-kilometer border, local families like Mamet’s were commissioned to help People’s Liberation Army soldiers to patrol the 47,000-square-kilometer border area while grazing their livestock.
Mamet’s father Obulu Esen became a patrol guard in 1952, but retired 28 years later due to ill health.
The role was then passed to Mamet’s older brother Tajden Opol. Moving to the unpopulated border area, the then 17-year-old was alone in dealing with solitude, danger and blizzards. Once, he couldn’t take the solitude and returned home. But the minute he arrived he received a beating from his father.
Mamet was just 12 the first time he joined his father and brother on a patrol. “That trip taught me the meaning of the words border and motherland,” Mamet said. During that patrol Obulu taught his young son poems about the legendary Kirgiz hero Manas.
The father told his son that the Kirgiz people are the descendants of Manas.His father’s words took root in Mamet’s heart. When it was his turn to become a patrol guard in 1997, he wept with mixed feelings. “It’s been a dream of mine since childhood to become a guard. But when it was finally my turn, I felt that I had robbed my brother of this most precious duty. I felt sad.”
“Grandfather always said that the best quality of our people is our loyalty to our country. This tradition lives on with us,” he said.
Among the less than 200,000 Kirgiz people who make up around a third of the prefecture’s population, there are more than 10,000 civilian guards like Mamet patrolling near the border, risking their lives every day on the rugged mountain paths.
Mamet has had arthritis for over a decade. As his legs have got worse in recent years, he started to fear that his days of patrolling might soon come to an end.He is often asked why he doesn’t leave, to which he replies, “this is my home.”
The main mission of this civilian force is to prevent illegal border crossings.
Mamet has now been joined by the next generation, his nephew Abudukerim Miman. His son also wants to be a soldier or guard when he grows up.
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