In China the public has welcomed the death sentences handed down to five Muslim Uighurs from Xinjiang region. The Uighurs are Indo-European people who comprised 90 per cent of Xinjiang when the People's Republic of China was established in 1949. Since then they have been reduced to a 45 per cent minority in a region now dominated by Han Chinese. The control is in the hands of the latter in a region rapidly growing economically. The ethnic links of this group to Turkmenistan and other Central Asian former Soviet republics and the rapid dissolution of the Soviet Union prompted the Uighurs to seek self-determination, not welcomed and quenched at every step by Beijing.
China's official story is that these groups set up terrorist camps as of August 2005 in attempts to achieve their goals. There were also official promulgations linking these groups with Al-Qaida. How true are these official proclamations? Is this intolerance towards minority groups? or is it a hardline stance on secession? As far as the global war on terror, China and Russia through their partnership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, reiterate their commitment in that regard at every meeting. This is because both Russia and China have large Muslim populations, either as neighbors or as minority groups within their respective territories. (for more on this see here, and here)
As to the death sentences, China is perhaps taking advantage of its remoteness to Europe... Russia did not have that luxury and abolished the death penalty against the widespread public support for it...
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