Local authorities said yesterday that Muslim extremists trained in Pakistan masterminded one of two deadly attacks over the weekend in restive Xinjiang, which left six victims and five assailants dead.
A police investigation found that organisers of Sunday's attack had learnt gun- and bomb-making skills at a terrorist camp in Pakistan, the Kashgar city government said.
'The heads of the attackers had earlier fled to Pakistan and learned skills of making explosives and firearms in camps of the terrorist group East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) before infiltrating back to Xinjiang,' the statement said.
The attackers adhered to 'extremist religious ideology' and advocated 'jihad' (holy war), it added.
'The malign intention ... was to sabotage inter-ethnic unity and harm social stability.'
Two further suspects, Memtieli Tiliwaldi, 29, and Turson Hasan, 34, were shot dead by police on the outskirts of Kashgar yesterday, the Xinjiang government's website said.
Beijing has long accused the ETIM, which advocates Xinjiang independence, of orchestrating terror attacks in the Western region. Meng Hongwei, deputy public security minister, recently warned of ETIM terrorists sneaking back into the country through Central Asia.