An electronic newsletter Produced by the Eastern Turkistan Information Center No: 19 11 February 1997 In this issue: (1) INTERNATIONAL MEDIA ON EVENTS IN GHULJE ON FEBRUARY 6, 1997
(2) RECENT CLASHES BETWEEN MOSLEM ETHNIC-UIGHURS AND SECURITY FORCES.
(3) CHINA SEALS OFF MUSLIM TOWN AFTER DEADLY RIOT
(4) UIGHER UNREST
(5) CHINA POLICE PATROL MUSLIM TOWN AFTER RIOT
(6) THE WORST RIOTS IN YEARS
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BEIJING - Chinese security forces arrested about 1,000 Moslem separatists in a remote northwestern border town after bloody riots against ethnic Chinese left more than 10 dead, residents said Tuesday. Access to Yining in the far northwest of China's Xinjiang province has also been sealed off after two days of riots last week, they added. "The press has reported that 1,000 demonstrators were detained by police," a Russian teacher said reached by telephone. Yining airport is also closed, the town is under constant surveillance from the paramilitary People's Armed Police and a seven-hour curfew is in force, he added. "Since the two-day riots that started on Wednesday, everyone has been ordered to remain in their houses between the hours of midnight and seven in the morning." Another resident said all public transport vehicles had been requisitioned by soldiers to ferry the arrested demonstrators to army police barracks. "I have heard that most of those detained were going to be freed, but not the leaders," he added. At the airport, a local official confirmed all flights had been stopped since the riots, which erupted on February 5 and spilled over to the next day. "The army is guaranteeing protection for the airport and it will reopen in a few days," she said. Other residents contacted by telephone said the local television had announced the cordons would be lifted on February 15. The propaganda official said the rioting, which pitted pro-independence Moslems against ethnic Chinese left "around 10 people killed and several tens injured." But in neighbouring Kazakhstan, exiled Uighurs said at least 50 people were killed during the rioting -- 55 Chinese and 25 Uighurs. The URNF described the riots as "a spontaneous movement by Uighurs there in the face of discrimination imposed by the Chinese" and no demonstrations had been "organized by Uighur separatist political movements." The Russian teacher said that in the town centre, where ethnic Chinese are in the majority, four Chinese and one Moslem Uighur were killed. "I've heard of other deaths in the suburbs, where the Uighurs are in the majority," he said, adding that police threw teargas and were armed with rifles, but he had not heard any shots. He blamed the riots on problems started when Chinese police arrested two Uighur Moslems for drugs. "Dozens of Uighurs, mostly young men, started rioting and burning vehicles and then they attacked shops and ethnic Chinese with whatever they could get their hands on while they shouted independence slogans," he said. The disturbances spread rapidly into the suburbs and the police had to call for back up from the People's Armed Police. The crackdown sparked a demonstration outside the Chinese consulate in Istanbul with Uighur demonstrators chanting anti-China slogans and burning the Chinese flag, the Istanbul-based daily Milliyet said Tuesday. "Chinese authorities have arrested more than 3,000 Uighur Turks in Xinjiang in the latest wave of violence," Ahmet Turkoz, head of the East Turkistan Association, told the rally. According to local residents, the situation was now stable and danger had passed. (2) RECENT CLASHES BETWEEN MOSLEM ETHNIC-UIGHURS AND SECURITY FORCES.
ALMATY - Eighty people were killed in recent clashes between Moslem ethnic-Uighurs and security forces in northwestern China, an exile Uighur group said Tuesday. The victims included 55 Chinese and 25 Uighurs in the riots on Friday, a spokesman for the United Revolutionary National Front (URNF) in Almaty, Kazakhstan, told AFP. Residents of the region told AFP in Beijing on Tuesday that troops closed the airport of the Moslem border town of Yining, in the far northwest of China's Xinjiang province, and that a curfew had been imposed. The town is under constant surveillance from both the paramilitary and armed troops and a seven-hour curfew is in force, said a Russian teacher living in the town. "Since the two-day riots that started on Wednesday, everyone has been ordered to remain in their houses between the hours of midnight and seven in the morning," he said by telephone. (3) CHINA SEALS OFF MUSLIM TOWN AFTER DEADLY RIOT
In this story: * How trouble started * Ethnic unrest * Related stories and sites BEIJING (CNN) -- Chinese authorities sealed off Yining, a town in northwestern Xinjiang province, and police searched Tuesday for members of an illegal Islamic sect following the worst ethnic violence to hit the predominantly Muslim region in 50 years. Officials and residents contacted in Yining, near China's border with Kazakstan, maintained that all was calm, six days after about 1,000 Muslim separatists of the Uighur ethnic minority rampaged through the town to protest against Beijing rule. Turkic-speaking Uighurs, who live alongside other Muslim groups and ethnic Chinese, form about half of the local population. Ethnic Han Chinese make up roughly 40 percent of the population. Many more Uighurs live across the border in Kazakhstan and other neighboring central Asian countries formed after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Chinese police dispersed the crowd with tear gas and arrested hundreds, but the number of people killed in last week's rioting is still in dispute. The accounts range from no deaths, according to a Chinese official, to an estimate of 300 given by exile groups. How trouble started A Yining police officer said on Monday that the Uighurs, demanding independence, beat people to death and burned three cars. However, a Chinese source said the rioting began after a Uighur criminal suspect resisted arrest by Chinese police. In Kazakhstan's capital, Almaty, a leader of the United National Revolutionary Front of East Turkestan said Wednesday's riot was sparked by the execution of 30 Uighurs by the authorities last week. But an official of the bureau in charge of directing the cleanup operation after the riot denied that report. Last year, separatist groups held running gunbattles with police and tried to assassinate an Islamic leader seen as pro-Chinese. Beijing in turn ordered the Xinjiang government to wipe out the separatists and illegal religious groups that support them. Ethnic unrest "(Police) have arrested several counter-revolutionaries and they are catching more," one Han woman resident said. "The Uighurs ... look happy because the [market] streets are full of them," she said in a sign of the region's ethnic divisions. "It's just them in the streets. It's all their people." However, Han residents said they were not afraid. "We are not nervous because the armed police and police are here," the woman said. (4) UIGHER UNREST
Chinese authorities sealed off a town in the far northwest province, Xinjiang following riots last week that -- according to some reports – killed more than 10 people. V-O-A's Gil Butler reports the region is believed to be a center of Uighur Muslim separatist sentiment. According to reports from residents of Yining, near the Kazakhstan border, the riots were sparked last week when police attempted to arrest a Uigher minority criminal suspect. A Uighur group based in turkey says the protests began when Chinese security forces arrested some Muslim women reading prayers in a private house, February fourth. Whatever the cause, most reports agree crowds of Uigher youth surged into the streets attacking Han Chinese at random. Ten people were killed and more than 100 others injured, according to one report. Others put the figure of dead and injured higher. Chinese police have confirmed an illegal protest took place -- sparked by what they call, "foreign hostile forces". Police at the scene are variously quoted as refusing to discuss the casualty figures and confirming four to five people died in the rioting. A spokesman for a Uighur separatist group based in Kazakhstan is quoted as saying 30 Uighurs died in the riots. Residents of Yining say the town has been sealed off. No one can enter or leave. Armed police are reported to be patrolling the streets. Yining is in the province china officially calls the Xinjiang Uigher Autonomous region. Forty-eight percent of the residents are turkic-speaking Uighur Muslims. Thirty-eight percent are ethnic Han Chinese. Uighurs once made up almost 80 percent of the population of Xinjiang. Over the past year, beijing has stepped up its anti-separatist campaign in Xinjiang . Also, authorities have tightened controls along the region's border with the central asian republics to try to halt the smuggling of weapons and materials considered subversive. (5) CHINA POLICE PATROL MUSLIM TOWN AFTER RIOT
BEIJING - Chinese authorities sealed off a town in northwestern Xinjiang and paramilitary police patrolled the streets after at least 10 people were killed in a separatist riot last week, residents said Tuesday. "No one can leave, no one can enter," one resident said by telephone from the mainly Muslim town of Yining in the Yili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture near the border with Kazakhstan. Authorities closed the airport and railway station on Thursday and clamped an after-dark curfew on the town, residents said. At least 10 people were killed, including one policeman, and some 100 wounded when 1,000 Muslim separatists of the Uighur ethnic minority rampaged through Yining Wednesday to protest against Beijing rule, Chinese sources and residents have said. The riot was among the most violent for many years in the restive region of Xinjiang, where Turkic-speaking Uighurs are in the majority and ethnic Han Chinese make up 38 percent of the population. Shops and restaurants were closed in Yining and paramilitary police patrolled the streets. Police had arrested many suspects and were hunting other rioters, one Han woman resident said. Hundreds of Uighurs had been arrested following the riot, said the leader of an exiled nationalist Uighur group in Kazakhstan in an interview in Almaty. Local officials said the number of arrests was much lower, but refused to give further details. "They have arrested several counter-revolutionaries and they are catching more," the woman resident said. "The Uighurs are walking the streets and they look happy because the streets are full of them," she said in a sign of the depth of ethnic divisions. "It's just them in the streets. It's all their people. No one else is on the streets." However, Han residents said they were not afraid. "We are not nervous because the armed police and police are here," the woman said. "If something happens we will...unite," another Han resident said. "There are also patriots among the Uighurs." Officials tried to play down the riot, describing it as a small incident fuelled by "foreign hostile forces." They refused to say how many people were killed or wounded. Yining is 30 miles from the border with Kazakhstan, where many exiled Uighur separatists live. In Almaty, Yusupbek Mukhlisi, leader of the United National Revolutionary Front of East Turkestan, said the riot was sparked by the execution of 30 Uighurs by the authorities last week. However, an official of the bureau in charge of directing the clean-up operation after the riot denied that report. "This is a pure fabrication," he said. "But I cannot tell you the reason." The rioters attacked Han Chinese on sight, smashed cars and set fire to shops, forcing authorities to mobilise 1,000 police and paramilitary People's Armed Police to quell the violence, witnesses said. Police fired teargas to disperse the crowd. The demonstrators, shouting anti-Chinese slogans, had marched on a government building, one official said. The riot erupted after a Uighur criminal suspect resisted arrest by Chinese police, a Chinese source said. Xinjiang authorities last year stepped up a crackdown on separatists and underground religious activity after clashes, bombings and assassination attempts on officials and Muslim leaders regarded as pro-Beijing. Last May, Beijing ordered tighter controls along Xinjiang's lengthy border to block the smuggling of weapons and subversive materials from nearby Central Asian states. (6) THE WORST RIOTS IN YEARS
BEIJING -- Chinese police searched Tuesday for members of an illegal Islamic sect accused of starting one of the worst riots in years in restive, predominantly Muslim northwestern China. Accounts of the riot ranged widely, with exile groups claiming 300 were killed and a Chinese official saying there were no deaths. Officials and residents contacted Tuesday in Yining city, near China's border with Kazakstan, maintained that all was calm, six days after Wednesday's riot. Reports of separatist- and religious-linked violence in Xinjiang -- home to Muslim, ethnic Turkic groups -- have become more frequent in recent years. A Yining police officer said Monday that the largest ethnic group, the Uighurs, ignited the violence. Demanding independence, they beat people to death and burned three cars. In response, he said, police fired in the air and arrested up to 500 people. Ma Shiqiang, director of the Yining police department's administrative office, gave a different version. He said about 200 demonstrators of an "illegal religious organization ... took off all their clothes and shouted slogans like 'Don't sleep. Don't eat. Don't work."' About 100 police broke up the protest, arresting five ringleaders. He said no one was killed. Ma's and other accounts could not be immediately reconciled. The governments in Beijing and Xinjiang seldom give permission for Western reporters to visit the region. Independence sentiment has strengthened among the Uighurs (pronounced wee-gers), fueled by resentment against Chinese migration, the creation of Kazakstan and other Central Asian nations after the breakup of the Soviet Union, and by Iranian fundamentalism. Last year, separatist groups held running gunbattles with police and tried to assassinate an Islamic leader seen as pro-Chinese. Beijing in turn ordered the Xinjiang government to wipe out the separatists and illegal religious groups that support them. Police patrols have been doubled to search cars and people, but Ma said there was no curfew or security cordon around the city, about 220 miles east of Kazakstan's capital, Almaty, and 1,700 miles west of Beijing. Prepared by: Abdulrakhim Aitbayev (rakhim@lochbrandy.mines.edu) WUNN newsletter index*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= The World Uyghur Network News electronic newsletter is produced by the Eastern Turkistan Information Center (ETIC) in cooperation with the Taklamakan Uighur Human Rights Association (USA), and is devoted to the current political, cultural and economic developments in Eastern Turkistan and to the Uyghur people related issues. Eastern Turkistan (Sherqiy Turkistan in Uyghur) is a name used by the indigenous people of the region for their motherland located in what is at present the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic China. The World Uyghur Network News brings information on situation in Eastern Turkistan from the Uyghur and other sources to the attention of the international community. *=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*==*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= EASTERN TURKISTAN INFORMATION CENTER |