Unknown circumstances of the deaths must be investigated! Xinjiang threatens with more violence in 2012

Following the execution of seven suspected hostage-takers who belonged to the ethnic group of the Uyghurs, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) warns about even more violence in northwestern China in 2012. "China's authorities are trying to control the Muslim Uyghurs by being relentless, but this brings even more violence to the troubled region of Xinjiang," said the STP's Asia-consultant, Ulrich Delius, in Göttingen on Thursday. "We demand immediate explanations on the background of the hostage crisis and a fair trial for the surviving offenders." Excessively brutal police operations and summary trials against Uyghur offenders cannot help to ease the situation in northwestern China. The "anti-terror action", that was started by the Chinese authorities in early December of 2011, will only lead to even more violence.

According to Chinese reports, the supposed hostage-taking in Pishan – in the district of Hotan, south of the Xinjiang region near the border to Pakistan – ended in a bloodshed on Wednesday evening at 11 pm, when policemen killed seven of the eleven suspected kidnappers. The authorities also reported about one policeman being killed and another injured, but there was no information about the two freed hostages. Without any further explanations on the background, the Chinese government announced that Uyghur "terrorists" are responsible for the violence.

The "anti-terror campaign" of the Chinese security authorities in the autonomous region of Xinjiang – which the Uyghurs living there call East Turkestan – is supposed to continue for 100 days. More than 200 flats of Uyghurs were randomly searched – mostly at night – both in the regional capital of Urumchi and in the South of Xinjang. The authorities confiscated computers, religious texts and photos of Rebiya Kadeer, the well-known Uyghur spokesman who lives in exile in the Umited States. In Urumqi, four Uyghurs were arrested and dozens more were sentenced to a fine for so-called illegal religious activities. "Instead of granting basic rights to the Uyghurs, they are collectively treated as terrorists by the Chinese authorities," said Delius. "This is irresponsible and will only lead to more and more violence and to a radicalization of the Uyghurs."