China worried about Xinjiang’s links with Islamic State

A top Chinese official said that some people from the northwest province Xinjiang are participating in the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group activities.

“The organisation (IS) has growing international influence and Xinjiang is affected by it. We’ve busted a terrorist cell in Xinjiang run by those who have returned from fighting with the organisation,” Zhang Chunxian, chief of the Communist Party of China, said on March 10.

Another top official talked about the growing usage of internet to propagate terror.

“Some people in Hotan prefecture in southern Xinjiang have been influenced by the IS; that influence is also felt in other parts of the region,” said the prefecture’s commissioner Eziz Musar.

“Authorities have to put this extremist content on their watch list and enforce the law by accelerating the crackdown on those who spread such illegal information,” Eziz added.

Hundreds of people have lost their life in ethnic conflicts in Xinjiang since 2009.

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