URUMQI, China: The government imposed a curfew Tuesday night in this regional capital of western China after mobs of Han Chinese with meat cleavers and clubs roamed the streets looking for Muslim Uighurs who had earlier beaten up people in the country’s worst ethnic violence in decades.
Rioting in the Xinjiang region broke out Sunday and killed at least 156 people. Tuesday’s new violence came despite swarms of paramilitary and riot police enforcing a dragnet that state media said led to the arrest of 1,434 people in the region.
Members of the Uighur ethnic group attacked people near Urumqi’s train station, and women in head scarves protested the arrests of husbands and sons in another part of the city. For much of the afternoon, a mob of 1,000 mostly young Han Chinese holding cleavers and clubs and chanting “defend the country” tore through streets trying to get to a Uighur neighborhood until they were repulsed by police firing tear gas.
The government has jammed mobile phone and Internet services, blocked Twitter — whose servers are overseas — and censored Chinese social networking and news sites and accused Uighurs living in exile of inciting Sunday’s riot. State media coverage, however, carried graphic video and pictures of the unrest, showing mainly Han Chinese victims and stoking the anger.
Wang Lequan, Xinjiang’s Communist Party secretary, imposed traffic restrictions and ordered people off the streets from 9 p.m. Tuesday to 8 a.m. Wednesday “to avoid further chaos.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang blamed the violence on Rebiya Kadeer, the US-exiled head of the World Uyghur Congress and Uyghur American Association. “Using violence, making rumors, and distorting facts are what cowards do because they are afraid to see social stability and ethnic solidarity in Xinjiang,” he told a regular news conference. Qin said Kadeer was behind the violence, adding “she has committed crimes that jeopardize national security.” Evidence had been found against her, Qin said, but refused to give details.
In Washington, Kadeer denied the accusations.
On Tuesday, some among the Han Chinese mob retreating from the tear gas were met by Urumqi’s Communist Party leader Li Zhi, who climbed atop a police vehicle and started chanting with the crowd. Li pumped his fists, beat his chest, and urged the crowd to strike down Kadeer.
To the east, on Xingfu Road, Han Chinese residents stoned a car with two Uighurs inside until it crashed, pulling one passenger out and beating him until police arrived, residents said.
Earlier, about 200 people, mostly women in head scarves, took to the streets in another neighborhood, demanding the release of their sons and husbands who were arrested in the crackdown and confronting lines of paramilitary police. The women said police came through their neighborhood Monday night and strip-searched men to check for cuts and other signs of fighting before hauling them away.
“My husband was detained at gunpoint. They were hitting people, they were stripping people naked. My husband was scared so he locked the door, but the police broke down the door and took him away,” said a woman who gave her name as Aynir.
