BEIJING — The Chinese authorities announced on Wednesday the arrests of five suspects described as Islamic jihadists who they say helped orchestrate an audacious attack near Tiananmen Square, the political heart of the nation, that left five people dead.
In a brief message posted on its microblog account, the Beijing Public Security Bureau said the suspects, all ethnic Uighurs from China’s western Xinjiang region, had enlisted a family of three to drive a vehicle across a crowded sidewalk on Monday and then ignite the car at the foot of the Tiananmen Gate. Two tourists were killed and 40 people were injured as the vehicle sped toward the entrance to the Forbidden City. The authorities had previously reported 38 injuries.
The occupants of the car — identified by the police as Usmen Hasan; his wife, Gulkiz Gini; and his mother, Kuwanhan Reyim, names that are identifiably Uighur — died as it went up in flames. The police say that in addition to gasoline and a gas canister, investigators recovered from the vehicle two knives, metal clubs and a banner bearing “religious extremist messages.” The police did not disclose the content of those messages.
“This was a violent terrorist act that was carefully planned and organized,” the statement said.
The police said the five suspects were arrested Monday, 10 hours after the attack, and had confessed their involvement. They said investigators had found long knives and a “jihadist” flag in the temporary residence where the suspects were staying. It is unclear why the authorities delayed the announcement of the arrests by more than a day.
Like the event itself, news of the arrests was played down in China’s news media and most outlets carried only a brief article from the official Xinhua news agency, reflecting in part the government’s skittishness over an episode that exposed security lapses at one of the most heavily guarded locations in the country.
The attack is likely to prompt heightened security in Xinjiang, home to most of China’s ethnic Uighurs, Turkic-speaking people who subscribe to a moderate brand of Sunni Islam. Concentrated in an arid stretch of western China, Uighurs have long had an uneasy coexistence with the ruling Han Chinese majority. But tensions have increased in recent years, fueled by a surge in Han migration to the region, a widening income gap and anger over policies that many locals say marginalize Uighur culture.
The Chinese government often portrays any resistance to its policies in Xinjiang as acts of separatism. Violent clashes between protesters and the police are invariably described as terrorism, and in recent years, Beijing has sought to blame outside agitators and Islamic extremists. Exile groups say that much of the violence is a response to increasingly harsh policies.
But until the Tiananmen attack, most of the violence had been confined to Xinjiang, nearly 2,000 miles from Beijing.
Rohan Gunaratna, an international terrorism expert at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, said the attack would help bolster Beijing’s contention that Uighur Islamists have allied with a terrorist group known as the East Turkestan Islamist Movement and pose a serious threat to the nation.
The United States has designated that group a terrorist organization, but many Western analysts have played down its size and its ability to wage attacks within China. Although the authorities did not immediately link the attack to the group, Mr. Gunaratna said he thought the episode would serve as a warning. “It demonstrates that whoever carried out this attack meticulously planned the operation,” he said. “It is likely to be the future of terror operations. These kinds of attacks are designed to inspire other groups.”
But Ilham Tohti, a Uighur scholar in Beijing, said he worried that the authorities would use the event to increase repression in Xinjiang. A vocal advocate for Uighur rights who is frequently confined to his home by security personnel, Mr. Tohti questioned the sparse narrative issued by the police, noting that news media restrictions have in the past prevented independent reporting on violent episodes involving Uighurs.
“I have a lot of questions about what happened,” he said by telephone. “It’s easy to point to a banner, but we’re only getting one side of the story.”
Patrick Zuo contributed research.
In a brief message posted on its microblog account, the Beijing Public Security Bureau said the suspects, all ethnic Uighurs from China’s western Xinjiang region, had enlisted a family of three to drive a vehicle across a crowded sidewalk on Monday and then ignite the car at the foot of the Tiananmen Gate. Two tourists were killed and 40 people were injured as the vehicle sped toward the entrance to the Forbidden City. The authorities had previously reported 38 injuries.
The occupants of the car — identified by the police as Usmen Hasan; his wife, Gulkiz Gini; and his mother, Kuwanhan Reyim, names that are identifiably Uighur — died as it went up in flames. The police say that in addition to gasoline and a gas canister, investigators recovered from the vehicle two knives, metal clubs and a banner bearing “religious extremist messages.” The police did not disclose the content of those messages.
“This was a violent terrorist act that was carefully planned and organized,” the statement said.
The police said the five suspects were arrested Monday, 10 hours after the attack, and had confessed their involvement. They said investigators had found long knives and a “jihadist” flag in the temporary residence where the suspects were staying. It is unclear why the authorities delayed the announcement of the arrests by more than a day.
Like the event itself, news of the arrests was played down in China’s news media and most outlets carried only a brief article from the official Xinhua news agency, reflecting in part the government’s skittishness over an episode that exposed security lapses at one of the most heavily guarded locations in the country.
The attack is likely to prompt heightened security in Xinjiang, home to most of China’s ethnic Uighurs, Turkic-speaking people who subscribe to a moderate brand of Sunni Islam. Concentrated in an arid stretch of western China, Uighurs have long had an uneasy coexistence with the ruling Han Chinese majority. But tensions have increased in recent years, fueled by a surge in Han migration to the region, a widening income gap and anger over policies that many locals say marginalize Uighur culture.
The Chinese government often portrays any resistance to its policies in Xinjiang as acts of separatism. Violent clashes between protesters and the police are invariably described as terrorism, and in recent years, Beijing has sought to blame outside agitators and Islamic extremists. Exile groups say that much of the violence is a response to increasingly harsh policies.
But until the Tiananmen attack, most of the violence had been confined to Xinjiang, nearly 2,000 miles from Beijing.
Rohan Gunaratna, an international terrorism expert at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, said the attack would help bolster Beijing’s contention that Uighur Islamists have allied with a terrorist group known as the East Turkestan Islamist Movement and pose a serious threat to the nation.
The United States has designated that group a terrorist organization, but many Western analysts have played down its size and its ability to wage attacks within China. Although the authorities did not immediately link the attack to the group, Mr. Gunaratna said he thought the episode would serve as a warning. “It demonstrates that whoever carried out this attack meticulously planned the operation,” he said. “It is likely to be the future of terror operations. These kinds of attacks are designed to inspire other groups.”
But Ilham Tohti, a Uighur scholar in Beijing, said he worried that the authorities would use the event to increase repression in Xinjiang. A vocal advocate for Uighur rights who is frequently confined to his home by security personnel, Mr. Tohti questioned the sparse narrative issued by the police, noting that news media restrictions have in the past prevented independent reporting on violent episodes involving Uighurs.
“I have a lot of questions about what happened,” he said by telephone. “It’s easy to point to a banner, but we’re only getting one side of the story.”
Patrick Zuo contributed research.
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