ISLAMABAD, 30 May 2004 — Some terrorists from the Chinese province of Xinjiang are hiding in Lahore and Rawalpindi, Chinese Deputy Director of Public Security Ma Mingyue told a group of Pakistani journalists visiting China.
Ma claimed that members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, or ETIM, have melted into the Chinese community in the two Pakistani cities.
The terrorist organization is not based in Pakistan but some of its members are present in these two cities, he explained. ETIM is one of the more extreme groups founded by Uighurs, the Turkic-speaking ethnic majority in Xinjiang, seeking an independent state called East Turkestan.
The organization is also suspected of being an Al-Qaeda affiliate.
Ma cited the case of Hassan Mahsun to substantiate his claim. Mahsun, accused by Beijing of bombing a building in Kashgar on June 17, 1996, allegedly escaped to Pakistan using a fake passport and stayed there with the people of Xinjiang before being introduced to Osama Bin Laden. He decided to move to Afghanistan where he remained in a terrorist training camp. Later he was “bumped off by the Pakistani police.”
Three Chinese technicians were killed in an attack late last month in Gwadar. It has still not been established who carried out the attack.
