The World’s Mary Kay Magistad has the latest on escalating ethnic tensions between Uighurs and Han Chinese in China’s western Xinjiang region.
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LISA MULLINS: I’m Lisa Mullins, and this is The World. Unrest continued today in China’s western region of Xinjiang, after riots on Sunday killed at least 156 people and injured more than a thousand. Rival groups of Han Chinese and ethnic Uighur Muslims roamed the streets, armed with homemade weapons.  The Chinese government has imposed an overnight curfew, in the hopes of restoring order. The World’s Mary Kay Magistad reports from Beijing.

MARY KAY MAGISTAD: There has long been a level of resentment and distrust between ethnic Uighurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang.  Many Uighurs see the Han Chinese migrants as interlopers, and colonizers.  Many Han Chinese see the Turkic Muslim Uighurs as backward, shifty separatists, who are ungrateful for the economic development Han Chinese have brought to the region.  Since Sunday’s riots, Chinese television has been full of scenes of stunned and bloodied Han Chinese shown as innocent victims.

[SOUND CLIP OF WOMAN YELLING IN CHINESE]

MARY KAY: This Han Chinese woman said in Urumqi today, “Every country wants world peace and harmony, and we want the same.  Our nation should unite.  Our society is such a good one, why can’t we all just get along?” But that certainly wasn’t happening today.  Mobs of Han Chinese roamed the streets this afternoon and evening. Carrying sticks, shovels and clubs studded with nails, looking for Uighurs and Uighur shops to attack, to take revenge for Sunday’s riot.  Some reports say groups of Uighurs today were also randomly attacking Han Chinese. Rather than call this what it seems to be, home-grown ethnic violence, the Chinese government is painting Sunday’s riots as a foreign-instigated, premeditated plot.  Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang spoke today.

QIN GANG: [SPEAKS IN CHINESE]

MARY KAY: He said, “These separatist forces tried to ruin China’s unity, and their terrorist nature will be revealed to the world.”  He blamed exiled Uighur businesswoman Rebiya Kadeer, who now lives in Washington, and is an outspoken advocate for Uighur rights. The Xinjiang government claims she encouraged Uighurs to take to the streets, a charge she denies.  Still, the local government has used it to justify blocking the Internet and most international telephone access into Xinjiang. In the midst of such crackdowns, the Chinese government usually moves swiftly to keep foreign journalists out.  This time, they’ve allowed journalists in, perhaps learning from the bad press China got when it locked down Tibet after last year’s protests there.  Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang.

QIN GANG: [SPEAKS IN CHINESE]

MARY KAY: He said, “We’ve been totally transparent and open about the events in Xinjiang, in the hope that foreign journalists will cover this fairly.” Actually, Xinjiang officials have told foreign journalists they can’t do their own interviews.  Officials instead took foreign journalists by the busload today to see the damage caused by Sunday’s riot.  But their best-laid plans to manage the news were blown apart by a couple hundred Uighur women in brilliantly colored headscarves, who smashed a police car window, and shoved past police to appeal directly to the journalists.

[SOUND CLIP OF WOMEN YELLING]

MARY KAY: They said their husbands and sons had been taken from their homes, arrested and beaten.  One woman spoke out.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: [SPEAKS IN CHINESE]

MARY KAY: She said “The Uighurs who protested have all been rounded up, and many have been killed.”  The Chinese government has not given figures on how many of the dead and injured were Uighurs, but this woman, and the others with her, clearly thought it was a lot.  She said, “Our situation is too tragic.  It would be better to shoot and kill us than to live like this.”  For The World, I’m Mary Kay Magistad reporting.

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