China has executed eight Uighur Muslims for terrorist attacks in the far western region of Xinjiang, including three who were convicted of masterminding a dramatic car crash in the capital’s Tiananmen Square in 2013, state media said.
The executions were carried out with the approval of the Supreme People’s Court, the official Xinhua news agency quoted the regional government as saying.
The eight were executed for involvement in an Oct. 28, 2013 jeep attack on Tiananmen Square, as well as other violent clashes with the authorities in Xinjiang’s Aksu, Kashgar and Hotan prefectures, official media reported at the weekend.
Xinhua did not disclose their ethnicities, but they all had names which indicated they were Uyghurs.
Xinjiang is the traditional home of Muslim Uighurs who speak a Turkic language, and China has attributed attacks there to Islamist separatists it says seek to establish an independent state called East Turkestan.
Their crimes involved five cases including the terrorist attack in the Tian’anmen Square in Beijing, the gun-seizing and police-assaulting case in Aksu, the illegal manufacturing of explosives and intentional killing case in Kashgar, and the establishment of terrorist organization, murder of government officials and incineration of checkpoint in Hotan.
Huseyin Guxur, Yusup Wherniyas and Yusup Ehmet had been sentenced to death and deprived of political rights for life by court for organizing and leading terrorist organization and jeopardizing public security with dangerous means. They masterminded the terrorist attack in the Tian’anmen Square of Beijing which killed 3 and injured 39 on Oct. 28 in 2013.
Rozi Eziz, also sentenced to death by court, was convicted of gun seizing and intentional killing of police officers. He committed the crime on June 28, 2013 in Wushi County of Aksu.
Abdusalam Elim had organized a terrorist gang with himself as the ring head since May 2011. The court found that Abdusalam Elim and others listened and watched religious extremist audio-visual materials and conducted illegal religious activities. They raised funds for members to conduct physical training and manufacturing, storage and transportation of explosives devices. He was sentenced to death and deprived of political right for life by court on charges of organizing and leading terrorist organization as well as illegal manufacturing, transportation and storage of explosives.
The court found that Memet Tohtiyusup had watched audio-visual materials on religious extremism, violence and terror since February 2013. He killed an innocent civilian on April 18, 2013. He was sentenced to death and deprived of political rights for life by court for intentional killing.
Abdumomin Imin had organized terrorist training since March 2008 and became a ring leader. He led Bilal Berdi and other members to have burned two checkpoints and two police vehicles in 2011 and murdered an officer with the forestry bureau of Hotan on Dec. 13, 2013. They were both sentenced to death and deprived of political rights for life by court on charges of organizing and leading terrorist organization, arson and intentional killing.
We still believe that Islamic based terrorism is limited to the Middle East and isolated attacks in the US and the UK, however it is very clear that Islamic terrorists are in most countries. Even countries such as China and Russia.
