URUMQI, capital of the recalcitrant Xinjiang region of China witnessed explosions killing 31 people and injuring 94. Officials called it a terrorist attack. It was the deadliest burst of violence this year. Xinjiang presents a threat to Chinese rule and is mostly inhabited by the Muslim Uighur ethnic group. President Xi Jinping has pledged to punish severely the terrorist attackers and maintain stability. Guo Shengkun, minister of public security proceeded to Urumqi with a team to investigate the violent incident. Earlier operations were directed from Shanghai.
Xinjiang has seen increasing violence claiming scores of Uighurs and Han, who are China’s biggest ethnic group. Right activists and exile groups say that the government’s heavy-handed policies have triggered unrest in the region coupled with its volatility. It was on the day President Xi Jinping concluded his first tour of the region that three people, including two attackers were killed in a blast at Urumqi South Railway station. In early March, 29 people were knifed to death at Kunming railway station by attackers who had reportedly come from Xinjiang. As usual, no group has claimed responsibility for the latest occurrence. What is clear is that the Muslim majority of Xinjiang have not integrated with the People’s Republic of China. China should abandon its repressive attitude and adjust its policies. The situation is comparable with the disaffection of Buddhist monks in Tibet. The Chinese political system is still totalitarian. This has so far prevented the powerful emergence of fissiparous tendencies which have become alarmingly manifest in the outlying states of the former USSR.
