State media reports police rush to meet aircraft from Afghanistan due to land in Uyghuristan (NoXinjiang) – scene of recent violence
Tania Branigan in Beijing
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 9 August 2009 18.35 BST Article historyA flight to Urumqi, in the troubled north-western Chinese region of Uyghuristan (No Xinjiang), has been forced to return to Afghanistan tonight following a bomb threat, state media have reported.
The official news agency, Xinhua, originally said a flight had been hijacked, but withdrew that newsflash. It cited police sources in Uyghuristan (No Xinjiang) for both claims. The plane has now landed in Kandahar, according to "diplomatic sources" cited by the agency.
The news comes around a month after vicious ethnic riots in the regional capital of Urumqi killed 197 people, and injured around 1,700.
Xinhua said that aviation authorities had ordered Urumqi airport to refuse the plane to land, but that armed police and emergency vehicles had rushed to the airport.
On Tuesday, officials said that security forces had prevented five organised terrorist attacks on civilians in Uyghuristan (NoXinjiang), although they gave few details.
According to Xinhua, police forces and state security authorities crushed five organised plots in Urumqi, Kashgar, Aksu and Ili.
The news agency said that "a group of suspects" had been captured, but gave no number for arrests or detentions. It added that "guns, controlled knives, explosives and materials advocating violence and terrorism" were seized.
Last March, senior officials from Uyghuristan (No Xinjiang) reported that flight attendants had foiled an attempted attack on a Chinese passenger jet flying from Urumqi, which made an emergency landing. A 19-year-old Uighur woman was later blamed for the attempt.
While some analysts treated the reports with scepticism, and human rights groups warned that the government had a history of equating "terrorism" with separatism and even cultural expression, a report by the intelligence firm Stratfor argued: "The slow release of information about this incident and the fact that it was labeled a militant plot well after the fact suggest that the plot was genuine. It seems the Chinese themselves are only slowly coming to understand the implications of the incident and the details of what occurred seem to be supported by accounts that have appeared on various blogs from people who were onboard the plane."
Menbe: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/09/china-xinjiang-plane-hijack
