Bomb attack kills 16 in China days before Games

By Emma Graham-Harrison

KASHGAR, China (Reuters) - Chinese police said a bomb attack that killed 16 police in the western Xinjiang region on Monday was a "suspected terrorist" attack, four days before the Beijing Olympic Games, state media reported.

The Xinhua news agency said two assailants drove a truck towards exercising border police officers in Kashgar, home of many ethnic Uighurs resentful of Chinese control of the region.

"One of the attackers drove a tip lorry to hit a team of more than 70 policeman who were jogging to pass the Yiquan Hotel in a regular morning exercise at about 8:00 a.m. (8 p.m. EDT on Sunday)," said the English-language report.

"The other suspect threw an explosive towards the gate of the station. The driver then abandoned the lorry to throw explosive at the policemen" after veering into a roadside pole.

Sixteen police were killed and another 16 wounded. Police detained the two attackers on the spot, and identified them as two Uighur men aged 23 and 28. Police suspected it was a "terrorist attack" carried out using homemade explosive devices.

The street had been cleared, with a tarpaulin covering the front of the hotel the only sign of the morning's carnage.

But security men in camouflage fatigues and red armbands chased away a crowd who had come to inspect the site, and a Reuters witness saw police just meters away beating one man with batons and trying to drag another away.

"It's sad the police who died were all so young, but this is wrong that they don't want us to see," said one Han Chinese resident being shooed away by the menacing officials, who gave only his surname, Zhang.

"But I don't think this is a terrorist attack, so I'm not scared."

Security forces also chased two Reuters reporters down the street, waving batons, and slammed a camera into the face of a bystander trying to take pictures.

But the rest of the city was calm, with no visible signs of extra security on streets full of both Uighur and Chinese residents. Locals said there were no reports of the attack on local media, though news had traveled fast by word of mouth.

ARM BLOWN OFF

Xinjiang's largely Muslim Uighurs have been a focus of China's strict nationwide security in the run-up to the Games. Officials have said militants seeking an independent "East Turkestan" homeland are among the biggest threats.

Many Uighurs resent Chinese controls on religion and the expanding ethnic Han Chinese presence in Xinjiang, a region rich in energy and mineral resources.

Some Uighur groups seek an independent homeland, and China has said militants have forged ties with al Qaeda, Hizb ut-Tahrir and other Islamist groups.