Eleven people were killed during an attack on a police station in China’s volatile region of Xinjiang on Saturday.
The Daily Mail reports that Saturday’s attack was only the most recent in a series of attacks in the region, due to unrest within Xinjiang’s native ethnic group East Turkistan Islamic Movement, also known as Uighurs. The attack was supposedly a response to the ETIM’s growing anger over discrimination in the region.
The group, however, said that the attack only occurred because Chinese officers had fired on a group of Uighurs who had been protesting, reports AFP. Uighurs make up less than half of Xinjiang’s population but they are still the most abundant ethnic group in the region.
Xinjiang is currently under the rule of the Han Chinese.
A total of nine people, armed with knives and axes, reportedly attacked a police station in the Serikbuya township. All nine of the assailants were killed during the attack though witnesses at the scene begged officers to take the attackers alive so they could be brought to justice.
Another four people – all police officers - were injured at the time of attack but two of them later died from their injuries.
There have been a number of clashes between the Uighurs and Chinese rule this year as the Uighurs fight for independence within the region. One attack that was blamed on the EITM occurred recently when a car drove into a crowd in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, killing five people.