Uighur group reports new deaths in China, urges UN observers (Roundup)

Sep 7, 2009, 11:40 GMT

   Beijing - Three people were killed and more than 20 injured after Han Chinese residents attacked Uighurs in China's far western city of Urumqi, a Uighur exile group reported Monday as it appealed for UN observers to investigate the ethnic conflict.

   The latest attack by about 100 'Chinese migrants' came late Sunday in a Uighur area near Urumqi's Xingfu Road and Jiefang South Road, the Munich-based World Uighur Congress said in a statement.

   State media reported no new attacks on Sunday in Urumqi, where migration has made Han Chinese the dominant ethnic group in the capital of China's vast Xinjiang region.

   A regional police official said reports of new deaths on Sunday were 'all rumours,' while several local residents said they were unaware of any gatherings on Sunday night and said Urumqi was 'pretty quiet.'

   The World Uighur Congress said two Uighur men and a 40-year-old woman died in the attack, but the report could not immediately be confirmed.

   'We are extremely worried about the current situation in Urumqi,' Dilxat Raxit, the group's spokesman, said in the statement.

   'Now it is very difficult for Uighurs and Han to continue living in the same city,' Raxit said.

   'For the safety of both sides and to avoid the continued suppression of Uighurs by China's paramilitary personnel, I appeal for the United Nations to send observers immediately,' he said.

   He also appealed for China's ruling Communist Party to hold talks with exiled Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer, who is accused by China of organizing rioting on July 5 that, according to government tallies, left 197 people dead and about 1,600 injured.

   Kadeer denied the charges and has claimed that up to 800 people died in Urumqi in early July, many of them Uighurs shot or beaten to death by police.

   Uighurs have long said they face discrimination at the hands of China's Han majority.

   Security remained tight in Urumqi Monday, two days after several top government officials were dismissed over the continuing unrest in the city.

   The government said five people died after tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets Thursday and Friday to criticize local leaders for failing to ensure security in Urumqi.

   The city's Communist Party secretary, Li Zhi, was removed from his post Saturday along with Xinjiang's police chief, Liu Yaohua, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

   Although the Han are China's dominant ethnic group, in Xinjiang, the Uighurs are the largest, but the balance is tipping as Han move to the region. In Urumqi, they now outnumber the Uighurs.

   The latest unrest there was touched off by reports of attacks by Uighurs using hypodermic syringes, the first of which surfaced in mid-August.

   The regional government said city hospitals had dealt with 531 victims of needle stabbings, most of them Han Chinese, with 106 people showing 'obvious signs' of needle attacks.

   Dru Gladney, a US-based expert on Xinjiang, said over the weekend that biased reporting by China's state media had worsened the hostility of Han residents towards Urumqi's Uighur population.

   'There hasn't really been an attempt to have any balanced reporting to try to report the Uighur side of things,' Gladney told US-based Radio Free Asia.

   State media 'tend to highlight whatever makes the Uighur side look bad to the Chinese,' the broadcaster quoted him as saying.

   The government's official Xinhua news agency said police had detained 25 people suspected of involvement in the needle attacks.

   Meanwhile, more than 2,000 officials and police officers have been sent to Uighur and Han communities in Urumqi to 'help solve public disputes,' Xinjiang's regional Communist Party leader Wang Lequan was quoted as saying Sunday.