Xinjiang, China
Chinese security forces killed 18 suspected terrorists last week in Xinjiang, homeland of ethnic Uighurs. China Daily said police captured “homemade grenades” and other weapons from a suspected training camp near the Pakistani border. Uighur groups and human-rights organizations were skeptical. “The Chinese government is always talking about the threat of instability because it wants to stop and isolate peaceful democratic activity,” said Dolkun Isa of the World Uighur Congress. Uighurs, who are Muslims, have been campaigning for religious freedom, sometimes violently but mostly peacefully, for decades. After 9/11, the U.S. government designated several Uighur groups as terrorist, to win Chinese support for the war on terror.
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