International   

Serial bombings rock Xinjiang

KUQA (Xinjiang): Serial bombings took place here in the early hours of Sunday. Seven bombers and a security guard were killed, and two police personnel and two civilians have been injured.

The police and cleaning crews have largely cleared the scenes of the bombings, but shops remained shut amid tight security and most streets in the city in the southern part of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region were still largely deserted.

A local shop-owner said the first bombing took place shortly after 2 a.m. in front of his shop. “Suddenly there was a big bang, the customers and I just ran away,” he said, adding: “When I looked back, my shop was totally destroyed.”

Not far from the shop, the doors and windows of several buildings were damaged, and some residents were evacuated to a nearby school. A Uygur woman said she and her family were awakened by the bombings.

“My two daughters and I have to stay at the school, because we are afraid to go back home,” she said. The police said the attacks against a range of official facilities involved at least 15 people and 12 explosions of gas-based pipe bombs.

All institutions and enterprises in the county, which is about 740 km from the regional capital of Urumqi, were ordered to close after the bombings. A few taxis were still running but passengers had to undergo security checks and questioning before taking them, and the movement of private vehicles was tightly restricted in and out of the county.

According to initial investigation, the devices were made of pipes, gas canisters and liquid gas tanks. — Xinhua

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Iraq wants ‘clear timeline’ for troop pullout
Medvedev, Putin accuse Georgia of genocide
Serial bombings rock Xinjiang
Yadav asks CA to step up efforts
Musharraf’s allies ask him to quit
More than 3 lakh couples cash in on ‘Olympics wedding’

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu