Twenty-one people had been charged with murder, arson, robbery and damaging property during ethnic riots that erupted in Urumqi, Xinjiang’s capital, on July 5, Xinhua news agency said.

A total of 197 people were killed over several days of rioting in the ethnically divided city, most from the Han Chinese majority.

Of the eight “leading” suspects identified in the report, six appear to be Uighurs. Investigations continue.

Rebiya Kadeer, a Uighur leader accused by China of inciting the violence, said the “shadow of communism” could fall on democratic Taiwan, China’s neighbor and diplomatic rival, which refused her permission to visit.

Citing security concerns, Taiwan’s interior minister told parliament that Kadeer, president of the World Uyghur Congress, could not accept an invitation backed by the island’s anti-China opposition to visit in December for a series of speeches.

“I am very concerned about the future of Taiwan,” the exiled, U.S.-based Kadeer said in a statement. “I fear that the shadow of communism may fall on the people of Taiwan.

China has claimed sovereignty over self-ruled Taiwan since 1949, when Mao Zedong’s forces won the Chinese civil war and Chiang Kai-shek’s KMT fled to the island. Beijing has threatened to use force, if necessary, to bring Taiwan under its rule.

www.reuters.com

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According to Xinhua, the state news agency, Mr. Hu visited rural areas and factories; a major oil center; and the regional capital, Urumqi, where the rioting occurred.

On Tuesday, he told government officials and security forces that stability was a top priority in the region. “The key to our work in Xinjiang is to properly handle the relation between development and stability in the region,” Xinhua quoted him as saying.

Reporters gathered in Xinjiang this week in anticipation of the start of trials related to the riots. But an official with the news media office of the local Communist Party headquarters said that he had no information that any such trials would take place this week.

The official, Li Hua, said Tuesday by telephone that a report on Monday in China Daily, a state-run English-language newspaper, had incorrect information on the timeline for the trials. Some Chinese Web sites and foreign news organizations, including The New York Times, ran articles based on the China Daily report.

“Of course they have to be tried, just not according to the timeline of the China Daily story,” Mr. Li said, referring to the scores of men, mostly ethnic Uighurs, charged with taking part in the riots. Mr. Li said he had no information on exactly when the trials would start.

The China Daily article, published on the front page, said that more than 200 suspects had been formally charged with an array of crimes related to the rioting that began on July 5, and that trials were expected to start this week in Urumqi. The article cited an unnamed court official.

It also said the local police had gathered 3,318 pieces of evidence, including bricks and clubs stained with blood.

Some Chinese and foreign reporters have waited in Urumqi for the trials to start. In late July, China Daily had reported that the trials would start in August.

On Tuesday, Global Times, a newspaper published by the Communist Party’s main news organization, reported that the government had not yet set a date for the trial and that the number of suspects remained at 83. Global Times quoted Hou Hanmin, a spokeswoman for the Xinjiang regional government, saying that the China Daily report was “totally untrue.”

The announcement of a trial date on a matter as delicate as the ethnic riots would usually be reported first through Xinhua. But Xinhua had yet to report on any fixed date as of late Tuesday.

The conflicting reports appeared to be an indication of growing competition among official news organizations in China as senior officials encourage more aggressive reporting on topics of international interest.

On July 5, mobs of Uighurs, Turkic-speaking people who make up the largest ethnic group in Xinjiang, stormed through the streets of Urumqi after clashes between Uighur protesters and riot police officers. The initial protesters had been holding a rally over the killing of Uighurs in an earlier ethnic brawl at a factory in southeastern China.

In the violence in Urumqi, at least 197 people were killed and 1,721 injured, most of them Han civilians, according to state news organizations. It was the deadliest ethnic riot in China in decades. The Han are the dominant ethnic group in China.

In the days afterward, Han vigilantes armed with sticks and knives went into Uighur neighborhoods to exact revenge.

Uighurs in Urumqi say the government has not given an accurate count of Uighur casualties.

source: www.nytimes.com

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The weapon was the Defense Ministry’s new Web site, its sharp home page topped by a photograph of a winding Great Wall and studded below with links to military news, video and photographs. The lead item on Thursday dealt not with missiles or troops, but with President Hu Jintao’s expressions of sympathy to Taiwan, which is believed to have lost more than 500 lives this month to a typhoon.

The site, which has Chinese and English versions, is another step by China’s famously secretive armed forces to give outsiders a peek at their operations, or at least the view they want to offer. The ministry named a press spokesman only last year; last month the People’s Liberation Army, or P.L.A., bused journalists to a base near Beijing for an afternoon of watching soldiers fire mortars and conduct mock counterterrorism operations.

A notice about the Web site said it was intended to give outsiders a better understanding of China’s defense policies, improve cooperation with foreigners and “display before the world the fine image of the P.L.A. as a mighty, civilized and peaceful force.”

The contents range from ordinary news (“Chinese Navy fights pirates”) to background material (“Thirty years of reform and development”) to carefully phrased opinion (“Sino-foreign military exchange and co-op boosts regional stability”).

Part of the site seemed to be a work in progress. Late Thursday, there was a lot of blank space at the top of the home page, and what looked like a photo gallery was evidently not functioning. It had no pictures, only blank boxes containing the word “undefined.”

In style and tone, the site is not radically different from some Internet offerings by the Pentagon. But while many foreign militaries have openly, if grudgingly, accepted public scrutiny in recent decades, much in China remains tightly held, from strategic doctrine to weapons development.

“China is more open to the world. So is the P.L.A.,” an army commander, Col. Leng Jiesong, told journalists during the July tour of the army base.

www.nytimes.com

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The Prime Minister defended the granting of a visa to Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer, a decision Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has conceded had angered China.

“The Government I lead is one where Australia makes decisions on who it issues visas to or not,” Mr Rudd said today.

The strongly worded statement of sovereignty comes during a difficult period in the Sino-Australian relationship, starting with the arrest of Australian Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu.

The Australian reported this morning that Beijing had snubbed Resources Minister Martin Ferguson while he was in China this week to sign a $50 billion gas deal.

Ambassador Geoff Raby’s failure to arrange top-level meetings for Mr Ferguson is understood to have been a reason he was recalled to Canberra for urgent talks.

Yesterday, Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop said the Government had failed to work constructively with China regarding the visit of Ms Kadeer.

“The Liberal Party is now saying that when it comes to Australia’s visa policy that we’ve got to get a permit slip from another country,” Mr Rudd said.

He said Australia’s relationship with China was challenging, and would be for some time, accusing the Opposition of using the Kadeer issue and Mr Hu’s arrest to play domestic politics.

“What we’ve seen instead from the alternative government of Australia is a determination to play domestic politics with this relationship on this and so many other aspects of it,” Mr Rudd said.

source: www.theaustralian.news.com.au

ABOUT HUMAN RIGHTS IN EAST TURKISTAN Uyghur Foundation Stichting Oeigoeren Nederland Stichting Uighur Jurat Barat  Stichting Uyghur Oost-Turkestan Uyghur Logo Nederlanders Holland Europe HUMAN RIGHTS  Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Erkin Alptekin Rebiya Kadeer

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