Astana, July 20: Thousands of ethnic Uighurs stage a rally in Kazakhstan, to express their anger at Beijing’s crackdown in the neighboring Chinese region of Xinjiang.
Nearly 5,000 Uighurs gathered in a Soviet-era congress hall in Kazakhstan’s biggest city, Almaty, on Sunday.
Protest leaders demanded a United Nations-led investigation into China’s crackdown in its northwestern Muslim region.
“China may not let anyone in (to conduct such an investigation) but we must do everything possible. It may be just a cry of despair.”
The protests follow the July 5 clashes between the Uighur and the Han Chinese in Urumqi which left at least 197 people dead and injured one thousand more.
The unrest — the deadliest of its kind to hit China in decades — has prompted authorities to take some 1,430 people into custody.
Up to half a million Uighurs live in the former Soviet states west of China.
—–Agencies