Three security officers were stabbed to death and another
wounded in renewed violence in far northwest China's Xinjiang
region, the fourth day of the Beijing Olympic Games, state media
said.
China has blamed two earlier attacks in the restive area more than
3,000 km from the capital on Muslim separatists seeking to disrupt
the Games.
One or more assailants jumped off a vehicle passing a road
checkpoint about 30 km from Kashgar and stabbed the officers,
Xinhua news agency said.
"These were just some terrorists," said a local police officer in
Yamanya, in Shule county, where the attack occurred.
A bombing and stabbing attack killed 16 police within the city of
Kashgar just over a week ago. On Sunday, 11 people were killed in a
series of supermarket bombings in Kuqa, in the south of
Xinjiang.
A perimeter of road checkpoints with armed security had been set up
in the immediate vicinity of Kashgar following the first
attack.
China says militants seeking an independent "East Turkestan"
homeland for Muslim Uighurs in the region are among the top threats
to the Olympics, which began on Friday.
But the government has tended to downplay the attacks in the
Chinese press. Tuesday's attack was initially reported by Xinhua
only in English.
Xinjiang is home to the majority Muslim Uighur people, who chafe
under Chinese rule.
Uighurs make up just under half of Xinjiang's 20 million people.
