URUMQI, China, June 16 AFP - China braced today for a high-security Olympic torch relay leg through restive Xinjiang, where Beijing’s rule of the remote western region is deeply unpopular among its millions of Muslims.
The torch was to arrive in the Xinjiang capital Urumqi tonight ahead of its transit through the city centre tomorrow morning before moving on to three other regional cities.
Officials announced a range of measures to safeguard the torch’s passage through Urumqi, including random checks of vehicles and a ban on firecrackers and other potentially hazardous materials.
``Our mission of safeguarding the unity of the motherland and ethnic minorities is extremely strenuous,’’ Li Guangming, a top official with Xinjiang’s sports bureau, was quoted by Urumqi’s Morning Post newspaper as saying in outlining the relay plans.
Beijing says it faces a separatist Muslim terror threat in Xinjiang, a vast region of deserts and stunning mountain ranges which is home to more than eight million Uighurs, a Central Asian people who have long chafed under Chinese control.
But Uighurs dismiss the claim as an attempt by China to justify its strict control of the resource-rich region.
Uighur exiles and residents told AFP that Chinese authorities had already employed a number of restrictive measures ahead of the relay, including confiscating the passports of many Muslims.
Muslims believe the step is aimed at preventing them linking up abroad with terrorists and religious extremists.
Authorities also have detained thousands, and forced Muslim religious officials to undergo political education'' on protecting’’ the Olympics, said Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the Germany-based World Uighur Congress.
Beijing Olympic organisers recently announced suddenly that the sensitive Xinjiang leg would be moved forward from its original schedule, which would have seen it arrive next week.
The relay comes after violent unrest in Tibet in March that laid bare simmering discontent in China’s minority regions.
Today, state-run Beijing News said the Tibetan leg of the torch relay would be held on Saturday.