Deadly Clashes Reported In China’s Xinjiang

Clashes in China’s restive Xinjiang region have left 21 people dead, including 15 police and officials, local authorities say.

A squad of armed Chinese security personnel patrol the streets in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi Photo: 

The incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon in Bachu county, Kashgar prefecture, a statement on the official Xinjiang government website said.

It began when officials searched homes for weapons, it said. Six “gang members” were among the dead, it said.

There have been sporadic clashes in Xinjiang in recent years.

The incidents come amid rumbling ethnic tensions between the Muslim Uighur and Han Chinese communities. In 2009 almost 200 people – mostly Han Chinese – were killed after deadly rioting erupted.

It is very difficult to verify reports from Xinjiang, reports the BBC’s Celia Hatton. Foreign journalists are allowed to travel to the region but frequently face intimidation and harassment when attempting to verify news of ethnic rioting or organised violence against government authorities.

‘Terrorism’

According to the local government, the clash was sparked as officials described as community workers searched homes for weapons.

Three officials “discovered suspicious individuals and knives in the home of a local resident” and were subsequently taken hostage, Xinhua news agency reported.

“Police officers and community officials from the township rushed to the scene, but were attacked and killed by the suspects, who also killed the three community workers they had seized earlier and burned the house,” Xinhua said.

Police then shot the suspects, the report added, and captured eight more.

Hou Hanmin, director of the Xinjiang Government Information Office, told the BBC that what occurred was a “planned terrorist attack” on innocent victims.

But Dilxat Raxit, a spokesperson for the World Uighur Congress, an umbrella organisation of Uighur groups, told the BBC the incident was caused by the killing of a young Uighur by Chinese “armed personnel” as a result of a government clean-up campaign.

There was no information on the identity of the assailants. Ten of the officials and police killed were ethnic Uighurs, the local authorities said.

Uighurs make up about 45% of the region’s population, but say an influx of Han Chinese residents has marginalised their traditional culture.

Beijing authorities often blame violent incidents in Xinjiang on Uighur extremists seeking autonomy for the region. Uighur activists, meanwhile, accuse Beijing of over-exaggerating the threat to justify heavy-handed rule.

In August 2012, 20 people were jailed on terrorism and separatism charges in the region.