was low and their armies were busy elsewhere. In 1867 the Qing government sent one of their best officials, Zuo Zongtang, a hero of the suppression of the Taiping Rebellion, to Shaanxi. His forces were ordered to help put down the Nian Rebellion, and he was unable to deal with the Muslim rebels until December 1868. Zuo's approach was to rehabilitate the region by promoting agriculture, especially cotton and grain, as well as supporting orthodox Confucian education. Due to the poverty of the region, Zuo had to rely on financial support from outside the North-West. After building up enough grain reserves to feed his army, Zuo attacked the most important Muslim leader, Ma Hualong. Ma was besieged in the city of Jinjibao for sixteen months before surrendering in March 1871. Zuo sentenced Ma and over eighty of his officials to death by slicing. Thousands of Muslims were exiled to different parts of China. Despite repeated offers of amnesty, many Muslims continued to resist until the fall of Suzhou in Gansu. The failure of the uprising in 1873 led to some immigration of Hui people into Russia. The descendants of the immigrants continue to live in the border region of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan. The Second Dungan Revolt (1895–1896), known in China as the Second Hui Minority War, was a second Muslim revolt against the Qing. They were defeated by loyalist Muslim troops. Boxer Rebellion The Boxer Rebellion () or Uprising (; November 1899 –September 7, 1901) was a revolt against European commercial, political, religious, and technological influence in China. By August 1900, over 230 foreigners, thousands of Chinese Christians, an unknown number of rebels and sympathizers and other Chinese were killed in the revolt and its suppression. In 1840, the First Opium War broke out, and China was defeated by Britain. In view of the weakness of the Qing government, Britain and other nations such as France, Russia and Japan started to exert influence over China. Due to their inferior army and navy, the Qing dynasty was forced to sign many agreements which became known as the Unequal Treaties. These include the Treaty of Nanking (1842), the Treaty of Aigun (1858), the Treaty of Tientsin (1858), the Convention of Peking (1860), the Treaty of Shimonoseki (1895), and the Second Convention of Peking (1898). Such treaties were regarded as grossly unfair by many Chinese, whose prestige was sorely damaged by the