Thursday, December 3, 2009
By John Pomfret
Washington Post Staff Writer
Twenty-two members of a Chinese ethnic group who participated in violent demonstrations against China last summer have surfaced in Cambodia, sparking concerns that Cambodia will ignore their requests for asylum and return them to China.
The 22 Uighurs, including three children, trickled into Cambodia over the past several weeks, according to Omar Kanat, vice president of the World Uyghur Congress, a group that advocates for the rights of Uighurs in China. He said that two additional Uighurs have been detained in neighboring Vietnam and that five others, who were known to have fled China into Vietnam, have disappeared.
Violent anti-China demonstrations led by Uighurs rocked Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang region of northwest China, on July 5.
At least 200 people died in the bedlam that involved Uighurs attacking Han Chinese and then bands of Han Chinese retaliating against Uighurs. Last month, China's state-run media reported that nine Uighurs had been executed for taking part in the riots. Kanat and other sources said that seven of the men who fled to Cambodia were wanted by the Chinese.
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