Muslim militants who joined Islamic State in Middle East ‘arrested in Xinjiang’
The restive region must join fight against terrorist group, its party boss says after extremists detained upon returning home from Middle East
Militants from Xinjiang who had joined the Islamic State group in the Middle East have been arrested after they returned home, the autonomous region's top official says.
"I believe there are extremists from Xinjiang who have joined Islamic State," Xinjiang Communist Party boss Zhang Chunxian said yesterday.
"We have recently arrested some groups who returned [to Xinjiang] after joining the group," he added without elaborating.
Zhang was speaking during a meeting of the Xinjiang delegation at the National People's Congress, which is holding its annual plenary session in Beijing.
China's special envoy on Middle East Affairs, Wu Sike, previously said about 100 Xinjiang Islamic militants had travelled to the Middle East for training and that some had remained to join the fighting.
Earlier this year, a Malaysian senior official cited visiting Chinese public security deputy minister Meng Hongwei as saying that more than 300 Uygurs had fled China to join overseas jihads in Malaysia.
Zhang said Xinjiang would take measures to fight against Islamic State's influence in the region and to prevent more Xinjiang people from joining it.