China Extends Xinjiang Clampdown to Some Mosques

Published on July 11, 2009 by brooks | This story has been viewed 85 times

URUMQI, China —The death toll from the racial violence in this regional capital rose to 184, with the vast majority of dead from the majority Han ethnic group, the government announced through the state news media. It was the first time that the government had given an ethnic breakdown of the dead.

According to Xinhua, the state news agency, 137 were Han, 46 Uighur and one from the Hui ethnic group.

For much of the past week, the death toll from the initial rioting last Sunday was at 156, and Uighurs and Han have both claimed the number should be much higher, and that deaths from each of their groups predominate. Uighurs are a Turkic-speaking Muslim race that is the largest ethnic group in this western region of Xinjiang, while Han make up about 90 percent of the Chinese population and are the majority in this city of 2.3 million.

The announced breakdown was sure to spark more anger from Uighurs, who are generally suspicious of the Han-dominated government and who say that many Uighurs were killed by security forces on Sunday and by Han mobs bent on revenge in the three days afterward. Han residents of Urumqi have been asserting that most of the deaths came from Uighurs killing Han civilians while rampaging through the city on Sunday.

The government has said at least 1,100 people were injured in the initial rioting.

A regional official, Wang Fengyun, said the government would give $30,000 to families for each fatality of the violence, and nearly $1,500 as a funeral stipend, according to China Daily, the English-language newspaper.

The rioting broke out when police tried to stop 1,000 Uighurs from holding a protest march over judicial discrimination. Uighurs went on a rampage, killing many Han civilians while fighting with security forces. That in turn prompted Han mobs to take up sticks and knives over the next few days and turn on Uighur civilians.

The Chinese government has blamed exile Uighur movements for inciting separatism, but Uighurs here rarely take a strong stand on independence, and instead express frustration at specific government policies that ensure Han dominance of the region’s economy, politics and culture.

The government kept up a tight security clampdown on Friday, with police officers and military troops patrolling the streets, and officials telling Uighurs in the morning that the customary Friday prayer sessions would not be held. But officials appeared to partly relax the ban in the afternoon, allowing shortened prayer services after hundreds of Uighur worshipers showed up outside at least two of Urumqi’s main mosques and pressed to be allowed inside, news agencies reported.

A protest broke out on Liberation Road near one mosque when dozens of Uighurs gathered along the avenue and began marching together, witnesses said. Police officers quickly showed up and detained many of the protesters, hauling them into minivans and a large bus.

Far south of Urumqi, in the city of Khotan, a Uighur city famed for its jade trade, mosques were open. Several residents said life remained tense but relatively normal. To their knowledge, no incidents of ethnic violence had occurred there this week after the killings in Urumqi.

On Friday, riot police officers lined the roads, they said. Some department stores had closed for a day or two. Though mosques were holding services, but some regular worshippers felt too spooked to attend. Instead, they chose to pray in private at home, said one businessman reached by telephone.

The man’s daughter said: “We can go out, but it’s best not to if we don’t have to. There are a lot of police outside. We’re still very worried.

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