Chinese police detain 10 Turkish nationals over alleged Uygur airport plot using fake passports
Masterminds planned to use doctored papers to help Xinjiang suspects leave China
Shanghai police arrested 10 people from Turkey who plotted to fly ethnic Uygurs from Xinjiang out of the country on forged passports, a state-run newspaper reported yesterday.
Some of the nine Uygur suspects also arrested confessed that they ultimately planned to travel to Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Global Times reported.
One of the Uygurs was a wanted terrorist and terrorism-related videos were found on suspects' phones, the report said, citing the police.
Two other Chinese citizens were also detained for their alleged roles in the plot.
The November arrests come after a series of violent attacks in Xinjiang and other places on the mainland in recent months that the government has blamed on Muslim Uygur separatists from Xinjiang.
Wu Sike, China's special envoy on Middle East affairs, said last July that Syria and Iraq had become training grounds for "terrorists" from the restive region in China's far northwest.
Nine Turkish citizens received forged invitations to come to China so their passports could be used to help the nine Uygurs leave the mainland, the Global Times, a newspaper linked to the Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily, reported.