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Attack kills seven in restive Xinjiang
ETHNIC UNCERTAINTIES: Uighurs, Turkic-speaking Muslims native to the region,
now make up less than half the population after waves of Chinese immigration
REUTERS , URUMQI, CHINA
Friday, Aug 20, 2010, Page 4
A member of China¡¦s restive Uighur minority killed seven
people yesterday in an explosion in far western Xinjiang, an official said, a
region that has long been the scene of ethnic tension and occasional violence.
Police arrested a Uighur suspect who drove a three-wheeled vehicle into a crowd
in a town near the southern Xinjiang city of Aksu, Xinjiang government
spokeswoman Hou Hanmin («Jº~±Ó) told a news conference in the regional capital,
Urumqi.
Hou said evidence indicated the blast was intentional.
She did not say what the motive for the attack may be. Chinese cities are
occasionally hit by small explosions carried out by people with personal
grievances, such as disputes over medical treatment or failed relationships.
Beijing often blames what it calls violent separatist groups in Xinjiang for
attacks on police or other government targets, saying they work with al-Qaeda or
Central Asian militants to bring about an independent state called East
Turkestan.
¡§Xinjiang¡¦s development will not be affected by a small group of bad people. The
overall situation in Xinjiang is good,¡¨ Hou told a news conference for foreign
reporters on a pre-arranged trip to the region. ¡§I repeat what our governor said
this morning: Hostile elements are always there, in the past, present and in the
future. They don¡¦t target any particular ethnic group since casualties are also
minorities. They are the common enemy of the Xinjiang people.¡¨
Many Uighurs ¡X a Muslim, Turkic-speaking people native to the region ¡X chafe
under rule from Beijing and restrictions on their language, culture and
religion.
They now make up less than half of Xinjiang¡¦s population after decades of
immigration by the majority Han from other parts of China.
In July last year, Urumqi was convulsed by deadly ethnic unrest after a protest
by Uighurs gave way to street killings and riots that left at least 197 dead,
most of them Han Chinese.
In June, the government said it had broken up a ¡§terrorist¡¨ cell planning
attacks in the southern Xinjiang cities of Kashgar, Hotan and Aksu. All those
killed or injured in the latest blast were members of ethnic minorities, Hou
said. She did not specify their ethnicity.
Uighur exiles accuse China of whipping up the threat posed by armed separatists
to justify harsh crackdowns in Xinjiang.
China has promised to increase investment in oil-and-coal rich Xinjiang,
strategically located on China¡¦s Central Asian and Pakistan borders, to try to
soothe income disparities that have contributed to ethnic violence.
Money has been especially earmarked for the relatively poorer south part of
Xinjiang, heavily populated by Uighurs.
¡§It¡¦s true that for historic and natural development reasons, Xinjiang has seen
unbalanced development, especially the three prefectures of Southern Xinjiang,¡¨
Xinjiang Governor Nur Bekri (§Vº¸¡P¥Õ§J¤O) told reporters earlier in the day. ¡§We will
make southern Xinjiang a focal point.¡¨
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