Chinese authorities released a letter Aug. 3 purportedly written by relatives of the exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer blaming her for last month’s deadly unrest in Xinjiang. “Because of you, so many innocent people lost their lives in Urumqi on July 5,” the letter says, the Xinhua news agency says. A friend and associate of Kadeer based in Germany said the letter was a forgery. China has blamed Kadeer for the violence between Uighurs and Han Chinese in which the government says nearly 200 people were killed. Kadeer denies the charges. (NYT, Aug. 3)
See our last post on China and the Uighurs.
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More Xinjiang protests
Several thousand people protested in Urumqi Sept. 4 over an apparent wave of residents beng attacked with syringes. State television reported that 476 people have sought treatment since Aug. 20 after being stabbed with hypodermic needles. The reports say 433 of the victims are ethnic Han, 12 Uighurs, and 19 Hui, another Muslim minority. The remaining are from other ethnic groups. China Daily reports that “members of the Uygur ethnic minority were among the protesting crowds.” The protests snarled traffic and disrupted the 18th Urumqi Trade Fair underway at the Xinjiang International Exhibition Center. The protests come at a highly sensitive time for China, as it prepares to celebrate in less than a month the 60th anniversary of the Communist Party coming to power. (Times of India, China Daily, Sept. 4)