China Points to Pakistan in Xinjiang Attack - WSJ.com

Pakistan-Trained Extremists Responsible for Xinjiang Attack, China says

Kashgar has recently seen a surge of violent attack, especially in Xinjiang, where Uighurs are known to regularly oppose and defy Communist Party rule as they ask for independence and accuse the government of corruption and ethnic repression.

Saturday, just a day before Sunday's attack, nine people were killed, and 27 injured in an attack in Xinjiang.

The relationship between the Chinese security forces and militants in Xinjiang had just reached a new low after two weeks ago the police shot dead 14 Uighur rioters in the city of Hotan, also in Xinjiang.

According to state media, violent protesters attacked and set fire to a police station, killing two police officers and two civilians.

A statement by government officials also said that on Sunday, assailants set off an explosion that triggered a fire in a restaurant, before randomly attacking civilians killed six people and , injuring 15 three police officers

Beijing regards Uighur separatists as part of a terrorist organization with links to al Qaeda, and has sought international support for its campaign against them.

Meanwhile, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, or ETIM, accused of training Sunday's attackers is recognised as a terrorist group by both the U.S. government and Beijing, and accused of training its members for suicide bombings, car bombings, or spreading bomb-making information via the internet.

Following the attack, Zhang Chunxian, secretary of Xinjiang regional committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), has ordered a crackdown on terrorist attacks, religious extremist forces, and illegal religious activities at an emergency meeting held in the regional capital Urumqi.

"People in Xinjiang should stay vigilant and recognise that terrorist attackers are the 'common enemies of all ethnic groups'," Zhang said.

The Pakistani Foreign Ministry has not commented yet, but the allegations that camps in Pakistan helped trained Chinese militants will only increase pressure on Pakistani authorities which the U.S. has accused of cosying-up to some of the Islamist fundamentalist organisations operating in the country.

Past violence

The weekend attacks were the second outbreak of violence in Xinjiang in a month.

On 18 July, several police officials and a number of civilians were killed in an attack on a police station in the city of Hotan.

Chinese officials blamed the attack on "terrorists" from the Uighur minority.

Uighur activists said the security forces had provoked clashes by opening fire on a peaceful demonstration.

According to China's most recent census, Xinjiang's largest population group are ethnic Uighurs, Muslims with strong cultural ties to Central Asia.

Our correspondent, Martin Patience, says many Uighurs are unhappy about what they say is the repressive rule of Beijing and are angered by the migration of the majority Han Chinese to the region.

In 2009, riots erupted in Xinjiang in which nearly 200 people died after tensions flared between the Uighurs and the Han.

Wikileaks suggest Chinese militants trained in Pakistan

May 11, 2011 02:18

Wikileaks' recently released Guantanamo Bay files suggest that Uighur separatists waging a low-intensity war against China obtained training and logistical support in Pakistan.

If substantiated and expanded to implicate the Pakistani military establishment or the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI), the revelations could drive a wedge between Pakistan and its most crucial ally, as it is the threat of "losing" Pakistan to China altogether that prevents the US from taking a harder stance in Islamabad.

Notably, China--which has insisted more vociferously, even, than the US that Pakistan is a hapless victim of terrorism rather than an active supporter of terrorist groups--was virtually the only world power to defend Pakistan against charges of duplicity and/or incompetence following the killing of Osama bin Laden.

COUNTER-TERRORISM: CHINESE PRESSURE ON PAKISTAN

The US and India are not the only countries, which have been pressing Pakistan to "do more" against jihadi terrorists operating from sanctuaries in Pakistani territory. China too has been exercising similar pressure on the Pakistani authorities to "do more" against Uighur and other terrorists operating from Pakistani territory, who not only pose a threat to the security of Chinese nationals living and working in Pakistan, but also to the internal security of the Chinese-controlled Xinjiang province.

2. The Chinese concern is due to three reasons: firstly, the threats to the lives of Chinese nationals. There have already been five attacks on Chinese nationals in Pakistanin recent years. Three of these were in Balochistan and one each in the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Four of these incidents resulted in Chinese fatalities. Two of these incidents took place after the Commando action in the Lal Masjid in Islamabad between July 10 and 13,2007. Three Chinese nationals were killed by unidentified elements in Peshawar and Chinese engineers travelling by bus in Hub in Balochistan had a miraculous escape when there was an explosion targeting their bus. In addition to these incidents, there was one incident of kidnapping of six Chinese women working in a massage parlour of Islamabad by some women students of the girls' madrasa of the Lal Masjid. They were subsequently released.

The terrorism is state policy of pakistan.

terrorists are irregular army of pakistan.

And here is compilation of stories by uyghur world congress.

Xinjiang Violence Highlights China's Pakistan Problem

Recent violence in the China's western Xinjiang province has resulted in more than a dozen deaths and prompted an aggressive security response by Chinese authorities, who assert the unrest is being driven by Muslim separatists trained in Pakistan.

The accusation, leaked to China's state media Monday, came as the head of Pakistani intelligence was making a visit to Beijing and exposed a potential sticking-point in the oft-celebrated alliance between the two countries.

According to Kerry Brown, who heads the Asia program at Chatham House in London, it also shed light on the delicate balance that characterizes the three-way relationship between China, Pakistan and India, which has long fumed over the training of extremists in Pakistan.

"Pakistan can really manipulate the differences between India and China and create a division between the two as it makes sure it is under China's protection," Brown told Trend Lines yesterday. "Beijing is very aware of this and also very aware of the instability of Pakistan's government, and so I think it has to play a balancing act."

Terrorism in Pakistan takes aim at China too. Writing on the Wall?