Beijing, May 21: China has linked prosperous economic development to ethnic stability in its restive Xinjiang region where nearly 200 people were killed in unrest last year, state media said Friday.
President Hu Jintao told a key meeting this week that authorities must strive to achieve “marked improvement” in Xinjiang’s infrastructure, ability to expand, ethnic unity and social stability in five years, the China Daily said.
“Separatist activities exist … (so) maintaining social stability and achieving fast-track development are twin priorities,” Hu said.
Hu made the remarks at a joint meeting of the ruling Communist Party’s central committee and the State Council, China’s cabinet, which outlined a blueprint for Xinjiang’s development until 2020, the paper said.
Last July, violence erupted in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi, pitting mainly Muslim Uighurs against members of China’s dominant Han majority. About 1,700 people were injured in the unrest, the worst in China in decades.
Beijing blamed the turmoil on separatist and extremist forces.
Many of Xinjiang’s roughly eight million Uighurs — a Turkic-speaking people — have for decades accused China of political, religious and cultural oppression.
A key gripe has been what many Uighurs see as unfair economic development benefiting Han immigrants who have flooded into the resource-rich region bordering central Asia and now make up about half of its population.
Earlier this month, state media said the government would pour around 10 billion yuan (1.5 billion dollars) in economic aid into the region beginning in 2011, aimed at raising living standards of the Uighur minority.
The move would be used as a weapon in the battle to “oppose separatism, infiltration and terrorism” in the region, the Outlook Weekly magazine, which is published by the official Xinhua news agency, said.
No mention of funding came out of Thursday’s meeting, which marked the latest in a series of government pledges of more equitable development for the northwestern region, as a means to quell simmering discontent.
–Agencies