URUMQI – Chinese police shot dead two people yesterday in renewed unrest in the far northwestern region of Xinjiang, state media said, after at least 184 people died in riots last week.
The official Xinhua news agency said the two people killed in the regional capital Urumqi were Uighur. Police were trying to stop them attacking another Uighur when the security forces opened fire, the report said. Another Uighur was injured.
Of the official death toll from the July 5th riots, 137 were Han Chinese, who form the majority of China’s 1.3 billion population, and 46 were Uighur, a Muslim people native to Xinjiang and culturally tied to central Asia and Turkey.
Uighurs attacked Han Chinese in Urumqi that day after police tried to break up a protest against fatal attacks on Uighur workers at a factory in south China. Han Chinese in Urumqi launched revenge attacks later in the week.
Zhou Yongkang, China’s top security official, said that while the situation was improving, the government could not rest on its laurels. “Currently, various instability factors still exist and the task of maintaining stability is arduous,” he was quoted as saying.
“The importance and urgency in ensuring Xinjiang social order should be fully learned, and the fight against separatism and terrorism in the region is a long-term and acute task.”
State media said earlier in the day that demonstrations against Chinese consulates in Europe and the United States showed that ethnic riots were orchestrated.
Demonstrators threw eggs, Molotov cocktails and stones at several Chinese embassies and consulates, including in Ankara, Oslo, Munich and the Netherlands, Xinhua said.
“Supporters of the East Turkestan separatists started well-orchestrated and sometimes violent attacks on Chinese embassies and consulates in several countries soon after the riots occurred,” Xinhua said, referring to the name given to their desert homeland by some Uighurs.
“The attacks against China’s diplomatic missions and the Urumqi riots seemed to be well-organised.” While security forces blanketed the city, more and more businesses are reopening. – (Reuters)