China ( Eight Die in Clash with Police in China’s Xinjiang Region )

BEIJING – Eight attackers died Monday in a clash with police in the remote northwestern region of Xinjiang, where tensions between Chinese authorities and the native Uighur people have been on the rise.

The confrontation occurred around 6:30 a.m. in Yarkand, near the traditional Uighur center of Kashgar, government Web site Tianshan News said.

Nine people armed with knives and explosive devices attacked a police contingent, setting at least one vehicle on fire.

The police opened fire and killed eight of the assailants and the ninth attacker was taken into custody, Tianshan said.

Two police and 14 militants died earlier this month in a similar incident on the outskirts of Kashgar.

Authorities blamed that clash on bands who “promote religious extremism in Xinjiang,” an apparent reference to the mainly Muslim Uighurs.

Sixteen people died in a battle between Uighurs and Chinese security forces in Kashgar just four days before the start of the Beijing Olympics in August 2008.

The following year, more than 200 were killed amid fighting between Uighurs and Han Chinese in Urumqi, Xinjiang’s capital.

The Uighurs, a Turkic people, complain that China is seeking to suppress their culture and religion and that Beijing’s policies in Xinjiang favor Han Chinese settlers.

China, meanwhile, seeks to portray Uighur militancy as a facet of international Islamic terrorism.