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China accuses high-profile dissident
of plot
Minority Muslim businesswoman has been
exiled to U.S.
Updated: 11:35 a.m. ET Aug. 25, 2005
BEIJING - China on Thursday accused a high-profile
dissident exiled to the United States of plotting to
sabotage upcoming celebrations marking the 50th
anniversary of the setting up the northwestern
autonomous region of Xinjiang.
Wang Lequan, the Communist Party secretary of the
restive region, said Rebiya Kadeer, a minority Muslim
Uighur businesswoman freed in March after years in
jail, had also evaded taxes, committed fraud and ran
up huge debts.
“She said that once abroad she would never do anything
to damage state interests,” Wang said of Kadeer at a
news conference. “But as soon as she went over the
border, she broke her promises.”
Uighur militants, whom Beijing calls terrorists or
separatists, have been struggling for decades to make
the region an independent state called East Turkestan.
Kadeer was jailed in 1999 on charges of providing
state secrets abroad and released on medical parole.
She was not immediately available for comment.
Wang, who sits on the politburo, making him one of
China’s 24 most powerful leaders, said that after
Kadeer went abroad, she had conspired with separatists
and religious extremists "about how to plan terror
attacks and jeopardize our 50th anniversary."
The party chief did not elaborate, but said Chinese
authorities had reliable evidence of the plot.
The anniversary falls on China’s National Day, Oct. 1.
Dilxat Raxit of the Germany-based group the World
Uighur Congress said by telephone that Uighurs would
only take part in the celebrations because they were
forced to do so.
“Uighurs have never accepted the Xinjiang Autonomous
Region and never conceded we are Chinese,” Raxit,
spokesman for the pro-independence group, told
Reuters.
Tight grip
The very word Xinjiang, a name meaning “New Frontier”
given during the Manchu Qing Dynasty, is considered
offensive by many advocates of Uighur independence.
Beijing keeps a tight grip on the restive region,
which shares borders with Afghanistan, Pakistan, three
former Soviet Central Asia republics, Russia and
Mongolia.
China has blamed Uighur militants for a string of
bombings and assassinations and bombings in Xinjiang
in the past decade, but Raxit said the independence
movement did not condone any form of terrorism.
“China links the Uighur political movement with terror
to make sure other countries do not encourage us,”
Raxit said.
Activists for an East Turkestan state are among the
detainees being held by the United States at
Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
Beijing has backed the U.S.-led war against terrorism
and called for international support for its campaign
against Uighur separatists.
“No country would allow this, so we must take tough
measures,” party chief Wang said.
At the news conference, Xinjiang governor Ismail
Tiliwaldi said: “Terrorists are now hated and detested
in Xinjiang. They are like rats run on to the street
and everyone is screaming ‘smash them!’ ”
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