Over 1,400 arrested in Xinjiang; fresh protests erupt

Urumqi (China), Jul 7 (PTI) Fresh unrest broke out on
Tuesday in China's restive northwestern region of Xinjiang,
where at least 156 people died in the worst communal flare up
in decades leading to the arrest of over 1,400 people,
including 55 women, in a massive crackdown.

A crowd of around 300 people staged a fresh protest in
the regional capital Urumqi as a group of Beijing-based
foreign journalists arrived in the city for reporting on the
deadly riots between the ethnic Muslim Uygur community and the
majority Han Chinese.

"A crowd of protesters surrounded a group of foreign
journalists Tuesday morning, shouting slogans and creating a
chaos," state-run Xinhua news agency reported on Tuesday.

It said 300 people joined the protest as about 1,000
people were watching.

Police has arrested 1,434 suspects over Sunday's riot,
including 1,379 men and 55 women for allegedly indulging in
acts of "killing, beating, smashing, looting and burning".

A government spokesman said the journalists, about 60 in
number, were visiting a Uygur community, when a woman and her
child came up, crying and demanding that the police release
her husband, who she said was picked up over the riots.

She said she would die rather than live without him.

China has blamed separatist World Uygur Congress head
Rebiya Kadeer, now living in exile in the US, for
orchestrating the violence.

"The police have started interrogations with suspects,"
said Li Yi, head of the publicity department of the Communist
Party of China (CPC) Xinjiang regional committee.

Among those who lost their lives in the riots were 129
men and 27 women while 1,080 were left injured, Li said.

Police has "clues" that some people were trying to
organise more unrests in Kashi City, Yili Kazak Prefecture and
Aksu City, Xinhua said, even as regional security officials
conducted raids on groups who allegedly plotted unrests.

In Kashi, more than 200 people trying to gather at
China's largest mosque were "dispersed" by police at last
evening, it said, adding checkpoints were established at
crossroads from the Kashi airport to the downtown areas.

A Xinjiang official, meanwhile, said severe punishment
will be meted out to the mob in the "deadliest riot since New
China was founded in 1949".

"The rioters violated laws and harmed the fundamental
interests of all Chinese ethnic groups," said Li Zhi,
Communist Party of China (CPC) chief of Urumqi.

Meanwhile, police has detained 15 suspects in connection
with a clash in a toy factory in south China, that apparently
spurred Sunday's riots in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The protesters, who went on rampage on Sunday, were
demanding a probe into a factory fight between Uygurs and Han
Chinese workers last month that had left two people dead.

Thirteen men, including three natives of Xinjiang, were
detained for participating in the fight in the Shaoguan City
of Guangdong Province. PTI WAJ
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