August 28, 2008 1:30

In China's Restive West, the Violence Continues

This report, from Kashgar, comes from Radio Free Asia.

Chinese Police Killed, Wounded in New Xinjiang Clash

HONG KONG, Aug. 28, 2008—Two ethnic Uyghur police officers have been killed and at least two critically injured after new violence erupted near the Silk Road city of Kashgar, authoritative sources and witnesses have told Radio Free Asia (RFA).

The two dead and wounded officers all belong to the Muslim Uyghur ethnic group, according to police and the chief nurse at Peyzawat [in Chinese, Jiashi] county hospital. “All of them were stabbed,” the nurse told RFA’s Uyghur service. “Two of them died at the hospital today [Wednesday] and two of them have been sent to the Kashgar Prefecture Hospital because they were in critical condition.”

The nurse, who asked not to be named, said they were brought to the hospital after a clash in Qizilboy village, Jiashi county. “Six or seven people came out and attacked them with knives,” an officer who witnessed the attack said. “Two officers died at the scene—one was the village police chief. Four others were wounded, and four of us escaped.”
A Jiashi county government official, contacted by telephone, confirmed that all the victims had been hospitalized with knife wounds. “They all work for the government,” he said.
The Jiashi county Public Security Bureau declined to comment in detail. “We have not received instructions as to what to say. You should call the command center. We are waiting to receive the specifics from them,” an officer on duty said.

Searching for suspect
The deputy Jiashi county police chief, Omerjan, said in an interview that the police officers—all members of the Uyghur Muslim minority—were searching a cornfield following a tip that a woman suspected of aiding assailants in an earlier attack was hiding there.
“We didn’t expect to come under attack in that cornfield,” Omerjan said. “They [the police] didn’t carry any weapons. Now there are 500 armed Chinese troops searching house to house in the area. It has been almost nine hours, but we still haven’t found anyone.”
In August, assailants attacked a checkpoint in Yamanya town, in Shule county, in which three guards were killed. Following the Yamanya attack, police arrested a Uyghur woman, Anargul, 50. On Wednesday, they were searching for her daughter, indentified as Amangul, 22, according to Omerjan, on suspicion that she aided the Yamanya assailants.
Seven people are sought in connection with the Yamanya attack. Police have identified five of those suspects as Abdurehim Ehet, Keyim Bawudun, Imam Hesen, Hesen Hoshur, and Abdusalam Sultan. Names of the remaining two were unavailable.
“After the Yamanya incident, we organized large public gatherings and asked people to help us find the suspects. We also said we would offer a 50,000-yuan reward to anyone who helped. But still nobody has come forward,” Omerjan said.
All of the officers were unarmed, the deputy police chief and the officer who took part in the search said. The officer added that Uyghur police are generally barred from carrying weapons.
Twenty of the 21 police working in the local police station are Uyghurs and one is Han Chinese, he said. The station owns only two firearms, both of which are locked in storage.

Stepped-up campaign
Exiled Uyghurs meanwhile say authorities in the troubled Xinjiang region have stepped up a campaign to quell separatism among Uyghurs there, making numerous arrests and setting up checkpoints following the worst outbreak of violence there in a decade.
The Munich-based World Uyghur Congress, citing communications from the town of Kucha in Xinjiang, said residents there have been barred from travelling outside their own county, with a half-dozen military checkpoints set up to prevent travel.
Kucha was the site of an Aug. 10 attack in which 15 ethnic Uyghurs staged attacks on prominent government buildings, killing a security guard and a civilian. Eight of the attackers were killed and two committed suicide.
Six days earlier, according to China’s official media, 16 police officers died when a group of Uyghurs attacked them with knives and homemade explosives.

No group has claimed responsibility for the deadly bombings and stabbings in August, but police have blamed Uyghur “terrorists.”
The World Uyghur Congress also said hundreds of Uyghurs have been detained in connection with the attacks. No official comment was immediately available.

August 26, 2008 4:12

Heads Up: Wither Post-Olympics China

Our take on this nebulous subject here.

August 25, 2008 9:40

SOH

Here's a comment from John Smith, a regular. Sorry dude, but lighten up a bit! This is supposed to be funny. To be honest, we get a lot of odd comments but a little tiny touch of SOH (look it up) is vitally important:

London will be excellent just by being itself. And having enough food at the venues, let all kinds of people protesting against anything, including the Queen's hair color and weight problems, and Charles' boldness. And, of course, Free Scotland. No internet blocking and full stadiums will make the London Games much better.

It is not how much you spend, not how many new buildings you build. It is allowing people having a good time that makes the Games. We will sure not having another Boring Olympics, or No Fun Olympics.

August 25, 2008 4:08

Monty Python Meets the Olympics: Welcome to London 2012

So, we asked ourselves, what could London possibly do to match the massive spectacle that Beijing put on for the Opening and Closing ceremonies? It couldn't possibly do anything to compare to the sheer scale of the Chinese efforts so (leaving aside the dire business with the double decker bus which I will pass over without further comment), the only answer was that most British of qualities: silliness. Check out the Mayor of London Boris Johnson at London House in Beijing on the night of the Closing Ceremony here. Priceless. Don't forget to catch Seb Coe (er, sorry, Lord Coe), head of the London organizing committee behind him cracking up repeatedly. Can't see Liu Qi reacting the same way under similar circumstances somehow.......:)

August 24, 2008 10:12

中国 加油: Zhongguo jiayou! Go China!

ADRIAN DENNIS / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

So it's all over. Hard to believe.

Anyway, there's a nice analytical piece on the meaning of the Games themselves here on Time.com and a piece on the zinger of a basketball final (when the crowd ended up cheering for underdogs Spain, who at several points threatened to pull off a huge, huge upset over the US redeem team) here.

Like everyone else, we'll have a wither China after the Games piece up later, to which I will link. Meanwhile though on that note, I was interested to hear that the crowd in Tiananmen Square during the closing fireworks were chanting: 中国 起来, Zhongguo qilai. It is a chant I hadn't heard before in the last few weeks and though ostensibly simple, is a bit tricky to translate. Simply put it means "China Rises" or "China awakens" but it definitely has a sense of something starting and continuing, so maybe "China is awakening" might be more accurate. The phrase has a number of historical echoes: first the phrase Mao Zedong used in the same square at the formal proclamation of the founding of the People's Republic in 1949, "The Chinese people have stood up!" 中国人民站起来了! (Added later: it also occurs of course that "Qilai!" 'Arise!" is the first word of the national anthem, repated lower down three times in a row as a call to action when "China faces its greatest danger.") Others might think of Napoleon Buonaparte's oft quoted phrase: La Chine dorme. Laisse la dormir. Quand la chine s'éveillera, le monde tremblera. China sleeps. Let her sleep. When she awakes, she will shake the world.

Anyway, enough history. It was a great moment for China. A moment to be proud of everything that has been accomplished by the Chinese people and look forward to even greater things to come.

中国 加油, Zhongguo jiayou!

Go China!