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17 October
China
Five Uighur separatists condemned to death in China
Two people named as Abdulmejid and Abdulahmad were
given the death penalty at a public trial in the town
on Yining, the site of anti-Chinese riots in 1997, the
Yili Wanbao (Yili Evening News) reported on Tuesday.
Three others were handed death sentences suspended for
two years and two more given life imprisonment, the
newspaper added, saying the trial was held under the
joint jurisdiction of the town court, prefecture court
and Xinjiang regional high court.
Under Chinese legal practice, the presence of high
court representatives would indicate all avenues of
appeal had been used up and the two receiving full
death sentences had been executed immediately after the
verdict.
Four others convicted by the court received sentences
of 15, 12, seven and five years in prison, the report
added.
The separatists were condemned for their role in anti-
Chinese unrest in Yining on two days in February 1997,
a town near the Kazakhstan border, according to the
German-based East Turkestan Information Centre.
A number of executions have been reported in the wake
of the February 1997 separatist troubles in Yining,
which saw upto 10 deaths according to official figures,
although Uighur sources put the toll at 100.
Xinjiang contains around nine million Muslims, mainly
Turkic-speaking ethnic Uighurs, who form a majority of
the population despite the rapid influx of ethnic Han
Chinese settlers.
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