Published by: The World Uyghur Network News, April 28, 1997

Nando.net Reuter Information Service

BEIJING (April 28, 1997 06:07 a.m. EDT) - Chinese paramilitary police shot dead two people in the restive Muslim region of Xinjiang last week when a mob of more than 100 tried to rescue convicted rioters from execution, an official said on Monday.

The People's Armed Police opened fire on the mob and thwarted the rescue attempt in Yining city in northwestern Xinjiang on April 24, a Communist Party official said by telephone from Urumqi, Xinjiang's capital.

Two people died on the spot, while five were wounded and rushed to hospital, said the official who asked not to be identified.

It was not clear if paramilitary police were among the casualties and officials declined to say if any arrests were made.

The incident occurred when vehicles transporting a group of 30 convicted rioters reached Qingnian Road in Yining shortly after sentencing and about 100 people charged paramilitary police escorts to

try to rescue the prisoners, the official said.

"The PAP fired warning shots into the air ... and had no choice but to take action after repeatedly trying without success to dissuade them," the official said.

"The whole incident lasted only a few minutes," the official said. "Things have returned to normal."

The 30 had just been been convicted and sentenced by an Yining court for their roles in riots in the town on February 5-6 that left nine people dead and 198 injured.

Of the 30, three were sentenced to death and executed on the same day. The others were sentenced to prison terms ranging from seven years to life imprisonment. All 30 were of the Moslem, Turkish-speaking Uighur ethnic minority.

The February riots had began as a demonstration for Xinjiang independence and turned violent.

Uighur militants want to set up an independent "East Turkestan" in Xinjiang.

China's leaders have said the battle against separatism would continue to top the government's agenda in Xinjiang.

Xinjiang, bordering Afghanistan, Pakistan and three mostly Muslim Central Asian states, has also been shaken by bombings in recent months.

Bombs planted on three buses blew up within minutes of each other in Urumqi on February 25 in an apparently coordinated attack that coincided with funeral rites in Beijing for paramount leader Deng

Xiaoping.

The bombings killed nine and wounded 74, mostly ethnic Han Chinese who account for about 90 percent of China's population of 1.2 billion but who are the minority in Xinjiang.

Police have arrested more than 10 suspected bombers.

Exiled ethnic Uighurs have claimed responsibility for the bombings and vowed to stage more attacks until they gain freedom for their Moslem homeland.

Last year, the region was rocked by assassination attempts on officials and religious leaders regarded as pro-Beijing.

Authorities have intensified a crackdown on separatists as well as on underground religious activity.

By BENJAMIN KANG LIM, Reuters