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China Tells US Not To
Send Wrong Signal To Uighur 'terrorists'
BEIJING, Aug 18 (AFP) - China has appealed to the
United States not to send the "wrong signal" after
Washington said a handful of detained Uighurs being
held at the US military base in Guantanamo Bay would
not be returned to China.
The United States should "handle the issue according
to international rules and with a view toward
international anti-terrorism cooperation and bilateral
ties," said foreign ministry spokesman Kong Quan.
About a dozen Uighurs, of Turkic descent, are among
the hundreds of detainees held at the Cuban base since
the US intervention in Afghanistan.
They face harsh religious restrictions and repression
in China since authorities associate the group with
separatism and terrorism.
Human rights and non-governmental groups had urged
Washington not to repatriate them to China where they
claim they face torture or even execution.
Kong called East Turkestan separatists "part of the
international terrorist forces that pose a vital
threat to people`s life and property safety worldwide,
including in China and the United States as well".
"The group is colluding with al-Qaeda, Taliban
remnants, Chechen terrorist groups and other
international terrorist organizations," Xinhua news
agency cited the Chinese Ministry of Public Security
as saying.
It said East Turkistan separatists had staged more
than 260 attacks inside the northwestern Xinjiang
region in which 162 people had been killed and more
than 440 wounded.
Xinhua gave no timeframe but there have been no
reported incidents in recent years.
Rights groups say China is using the global war on
terror to justify repression of its Uighur community
and US Secretary of State Colin Powell said last week
the Guantanamo detainees would not be returned to
China.
"The Uighurs are not going back to China, but finding
places for them is not a simple matter, but we are
trying to find places for them." he said.
Exiled Uighur Muslim groups are seeking to
re-establish an independent East Turkestan in Central
Asia that has existed historically and was established
in the 1940s in the presently Chinese-controlled
Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.
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