By 07/06/2009, there are 156 people killed (129 males, 27 females) and 1080 people injured in the Urumqi, Xinjiang riot toll. ( Urumqi is the capital of the Xinjiang province, China ) Now the Chinese police have arrested 1434 crime suspects in this event.
The cause of this riot toll is a fight between the Xinjiang people and Han people in a toy company named Xuri in Shaoguan, Guangdong province. On 06/16/2009, some people posted a new topic named “6 Xinjiang people raped 2 young Han girls in Xuri” to a local internet forum in Shaoguan. This topic then was reposted to serveral big web sites. The police did lots of investigations and found out this is totally a rumor. There was no rape crime in the Xuri Toy Corp. The truth is this people who posted this rumor to the Internet was fired by the boss of Xuri. He used this rumor to revenge and show his dissatisfaction to Xuri. Now the police have arrested this suspect.
But this rumor still caused a huge damage. Lots of Han people became angry about the Xinjiang people in the Xuri Toy Corp. On 06/26/2009, the big fight between the Han people and Xinjiang people caused 2 Xinjiang people to be killed and 118 people injured in the end. (Xuri Toy Corp. is a Hong Kong company and it has more than 10,000 employees, which include 800 Xinjiang employees.)
On 07/05/2009, the big riot toll broke out in Urumqi,Xinjiang. 260 vehicles and 220 homes were burned in this riot toll. Now the injured people have been sent to 10 hospitals in Urumqi,Xinjiang. It looks like this riot toll is just a revenge to the Han people by the Xinjiang people. But it is not this simple.
Uighur residents, speaking softly in alleyways away from patrolling police and troops, complained about the growing Han Chinese presence. Some said many of those arrested were youths caught up in indiscriminate police sweeps of the rundown concrete apartments where many Uighurs live. “They’ve been taking away all the young people, going into our homes and taking them away,” said Amina, a middle-aged woman in a Muslim headscarf sitting on the steps of a mosque. She said her own son had been taken but did not want to give his name. “They don’t care who they take, as long as you’re between 17 and 20 and they don’t like the look of you,” she said as her neighbors shook their heads and clucked in sympathy.
In other big Chinese cities like Beijing,Shanghai,Guangzhou. Lots of Han people think that all the Xinjiang people are thieves. Although some Xinjiang people did commit some crimes in these big cities, this is a sign of the potential conflicts between the Han people and Xinjiang people.