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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Death toll from west China's violence rises to 35 |
| 2013-06-28 |
| The official death toll rose to 35 Friday from an outburst of violence that included knife attacks on police in a far-western region that has seen frequent clashes between China's Muslim minority Uighurs and the ethnic Han majority. Initial reports said 27 people were killed Wednesday in a remote town in the Xinjiang region, with state-run media saying that knife-wielding assailants targeted police stations, a government building and a construction site - all symbols of Han authority and influx in the region. The updated death toll included some of the severely injured dying in the hospital. It also included 11 assailants shot dead in Lukqun township in Turpan prefecture, the state-run Xinhua News agency said. Two police officers were among the 24 people they killed, Xinhua said. The reports did not identify the ethnicity of the attackers, nor explain what may have caused the conflict in the Turkic-speaking region, where Uighurs have complained of suppression and discrimination by Han people. The report also said police captured four injured assailants. The Wednesday violence - described as a terrorist act by China's state media - was 1 of the bloodiest incidents since unrest in the region's capital city of Urumqi killed nearly 200 in 2009. It was impossible to independently confirm the state-run media accounts. The Global Times said police set up many checkpoints along the 30-kilometer (19-mile) road to Lukqun and dissuaded reporters from traveling there due to safety concerns. Information is tightly controlled in the region, which the Chinese government regards as highly sensitive and where it has imposed a heavy security presence to quell unrest. However, forces are spread thin across the vast territory and the response from authorities is often slow. Xinjiang (shihn-jeeahng) is home to a large population of minority Muslim Uighurs (WEE'-gurs) in a region that borders Central Asia, Afghanistan and Pakistan and has been the scene of numerous violent acts in recent years, including the riots in the capital four years ago. |
| Posted by:tipper |