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Woman behind Xinjiang riot caught self-contradictory

2009-07-11 10:18 BJT

Special Report: 7.5 Xinjiang Urumqi Riots |

by Xinhua writer Yu Zheng

BEIJING, July 11 (Xinhua) -- Denying their role in the bloodbath in Urumqi that killed 156, a woman in exile and her Washington D.C.-based organization were busy before and after the tragic killings.

Rebiya Kadeer, 62, chairwoman of the World Uygur Congress (WUC) that has close contact with terrorist organizations, was found making phone calls before the riot to her brother in Xinjiang to "predict" that "something big would happen." And after the riot, she was busy meeting the international press.

But very too often, Kadeer was caught self-contradictory when making accusations against the Chinese government and disseminating "unconfirmed" reports from anonymous sources.

While repeatedly grumbling about the government's shutdown on telephone lines and Internet access and soliciting international pressure for transparency, she boldly asserted "hundreds of Uygurs are now dead" based on her alleged contacts from capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.

One significant source of her is "within East Turkestan," a hotbed of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) which was listed in 2002 by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization. And the WUC was formed by two organizations, one of which was the Uygur Youth Congress, also labeled a terrorist organization.