Beijing: Xinjiang, the restive region in the far west of China, saw its worst violence since large-scale ethnic unrest in 2009 when a riot left at least 27 people dead on Wednesday.
Xinhua, the official news agency, said knife-wielding mobs had attacked police stations, the local government building and a construction site in Lukqun, a remote township some 200km east of Urumqi, the regional capital, early in the morning.
Quoting local Communist party officials, the report said the rioters had stabbed people and set police cars on fire. “Seventeen people had been killed – including nine policemen or security guards and eight civilians – before police opened fire and shot dead 10 rioters,” the report said.
Xinhua did not mention what triggered the unrest, and the information could not be independently verified.
A regional government spokesman said he had no information.
A woman reached by phone close to Lukqun said there had been unrest “in town” but she didn’t know any details.
The region, which holds a significant portion of the country’s oil and gas reserves, has been shaken by increasingly frequent violent unrest in recent years.
The Uighurs, a Turkic people whose majority are Muslims, used to dominate Xinjiang, but the ethnic group is on the verge of being outnumbered by Han Chinese following many years of government-encouraged migration.
In July 2009, at least 197 people were killed in ethnic riots in Urumqi when an Uighur mob turned against Han residents. Han mobs later paraded the streets seeking revenge.
In April this year, 21 died in a rural town near Kashgar, China’s westernmost city, in a shoot-out between armed Uighurs and police.
February last year saw 20 killed in the far south of Xinjiang in a knife attack in a local market.
In July 2011, four died when armed men attacked a police station in Hotan, and days later knife attacks were reported from Kashgar.
Beijing has long tried to co-opt the local people by pouring investment into the region. But local residents complain that only Han migrants benefit.
In multiple interviews conducted in different parts of Xinjiang since 2009, many local residents expressed strong resentment against the Han and said they did not want to be part of China.
Beijing has stepped up its attempts to develop the region faster, and intensified surveillance by sending thousands of additional security forces and social workers to Xinjiang villages and towns.
One Uighur resident in Beijing said potential triggers for the latest unrest could have been the intensified security measures ahead of the 2009 riots anniversary on July 5 as well as increased pressure put on local residents not to let their children fast during Ramadan, the holy month that starts in early July.
Dilxat Raxit, a spokesman for the World Uyghur Congress, an opposition group based in Germany, said China had to “stop imposing policies on Xinjiang that cause turmoil”.
A Chinese trader who does business in Xinjiang expressed alarm at the unrest in Lukqun, saying this area had not been known for sectarian violence. |
