Chinese police shot dead dozens of knife-wielding attackers on Monday morning after they staged assaults on two towns in the western region of Xinjiang, the official Xinhua news agency said yesterday.
A gang armed with knives had first attacked a police station and government offices in the town of Elixku, in Shache county, it said, quoting local police. Some moved on to a nearby town, attacking civilians and smashing and setting fire to six vehicles.
“Police officers at the scene shot dead dozens of members of the mob,” the report said.
An initial investigation showed that it was an “organised and premeditated terrorist attack”, Xinhua added.
The dead and injured include not just Uighurs but members of China’s majority Han Chinese population, the report said.
China will use this incidentto step up repression
The US-based Rebiya Kadeer, president of the exiled World Uyghur Congress, called for restraint, saying in a statement that she was worried “China will use this incident to step up repression, causing more people to loose their freedom”.
The attack took place at the end of the holy month of Ramadan, which officials had tried to get Muslims in Xinjiang to ignore, in an indication of what rights groups say is discrimination targeting the Uighurs.
Xinjiang, home to many Turkic-speaking Uighurs, has for years been beset by violence, which the government blames on Islamist militants or separatists who it says are bent on establishing an independent state called East Turkestan.
China says Uighur militants have based themselves in countries including Afghanistan and Pakistan in recent years, and this week China’s special envoy for the Middle East said some had also likely been trained in Syria and Iraq.
Exiled Uighur groups and human rights activists say the government’s repressive policies in Xinjiang, including controls on Islam, have provoked unrest, a claim Beijing denies.
Xinjiang, resource-rich and strategically located on the borders of central Asia, is crucial to meeting China’s growing energy needs. More than 200 people have died in unrest in Xinjiang in the past year or so, the government says, prompting a tough crackdown by Beijing.