Xinjiang gang trained for “holy war”: police

Chinese police said that the suspects killed in arrested in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous region on Tuesday were part of a gang trained for “holy war.”

Police raided a residential apartment on Tuanjie Road in the capital of Urumqi on Tuesday afternoon, Xinhua reported. Five suspects were killed, two others were injured and another eight taken into custody. One policeman was also injured during the incident.

All 15, five women and 10 men, were from the Uygur minority. A police spokesman said the suspects wielded knives and threatened to “perish together” with the 15 policemen who cornered them.

Police were forced to open fire after the armed suspects ran out of their apartment after tear gas was was fired into the premises.

Local police have been looking for three men in the group who were suspected of stabbing a Han woman at an Urumqi beauty salon on May 23.

The suspects confessed they had been trained to launch a “holy war” against the Han majority, whom they considered heretics, Xinhua said. They were also planning to found their own state.

A separate report in CRI Nordic said that in the first half of 2008, police have arrested 82 suspected terrorists from the region.

The incident comes as focus on security arrangements for the Olympics grows.

According to Reuters, Xinjiang separatists have earlier been accused of attempting to crash a plane in March and planning to kidnap athletes and journalists during the Games.