"We should fight against separatist activities by the Dalai group" ... Xi Jingping, Vice-President of China "We should fight against separatist activities by the Dalai group" ... Xi Jingping, Vice-President of China
BEIJING: The Chinese Vice-President, Xi Jinping, has vowed to crush any attempt to undermine stability in Tibet in a speech marking 60 years since China cemented control over the region.
His comments came as it emerged that 20 people had been killed in clashes between police and protesters from China's minority Uighur community in the ethnically tense north-western region of Xinjiang.
Mr Xi spoke yesterday, a day after the exiled Dalai Lama, the region's spiritual leader, concluded a visit to the US during which he was welcomed warmly by the President, Barack Obama, angering China.
''We should fight against separatist activities by the Dalai group … and take measures to address root causes, and smash any attempt to undermine stability in Tibet and the national unity of the motherland,'' Mr Xi said.
Mr Xi, widely expected to be the Chinese president by 2013, spoke to thousands of people at the central square of the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, in a speech broadcast live on national television.
He was part of a 59-member delegation to Tibet that included the chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army, Chen Bingde, and head of the Communist Party's United Front Work Department, Du Qinglin.
Speaking beneath the Potala palace, home of Tibet's past theocratic rulers, Mr Xi praised the Communist Party's leadership in the region and promised more of the rapid development that has angered many Tibetans who fear their unique Buddhist culture is being swamped.
Brushing off warnings from China, Mr Obama met the Dalai Lama at the White House on Saturday, urging respect for human rights in Tibet and its cultural traditions. China lodged a protest and accused Mr Obama of undermining relations between the world's two largest economies.
On Monday, attackers armed with Molotov cocktails and explosives stormed a police station in Xinjiang province, killing and wounding several officers, taking hostages and setting the building on fire, a local official and a report from the state-run news agency, Xinhua, said.
A group based in Germany that represents Uighurs, the Turkic ethnic group in Xinjiang, claimed the invaders were Uighurs angered by a wave of arrests of young men. That report could not be confirmed.
Xinjiang has seen periodic violence by the Uighurs, whose culture and Islamic traditions have eroded under decades of restrictions imposed by the Chinese government and a huge influx of settlers belonging to the country's majority ethnic group, the Han.
Chinese officials said the unrest was caused by a small group of terrorists who want to split Xinjiang from China.
The attack took place in Hotan, a desert town of 115,000 about 100 kilometres north of the Himalayas. Official accounts said ''several thugs'' invaded the station and took eight hostages.
The police rescued six hostages. Two others died, as did one paramilitary officer and a guard, Xinhua reported.
Agence France-Presse, The New York Times