A flight crew prevented an attempt to crash a Chinese jetliner last week, says a senior Chinese official.
Nur Bekri, governor of the large western Xinjiang region, said Sunday that the incident occurred Friday morning. The incident came to light during a discussion in Beijing about terrorism.
"According to the government, two crew members noticed something unusual . . . and this would have been a major air disaster had authorities not taken into custody two passengers on that plane," CTV's Beijing Bureau Chief Steve Chao told Newsnet from Beijing.
Nur Bekri did not provide many details about the alleged terror attack, other then it involved a China Southern Airlines flight out of the western city of Urumuqi.
The plane made an emergency landing in the city of Lanzhou with no damage or injuries. Nur Bekri did not say who was suspected to be behind the attack, adding that the incident was under investigation.
Also on Sunday, another Chinese official said police have captured and killed alleged Islamic terrorists plotting attacks to be carried out during the Beijing Olympics.
Wang Lequon, a senior Communist Party official says police have made raids in the country that showed that there have been specific plans to sabotage the Games.
He cited a Jan. 27 raid against plotters in the regional capital of Urumqi as evidence.
The state-run Global Times newspaper said the group had planned bombings for Feb. 5, the last business day before the start of the Lunar New Year holiday. The paper did not mention the Olympics.
Wang Lequon says the group was following orders from the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, an organization based out of Pakistan and Afghanistan. In 2002, the United Nations declared that group a terrorist organization.
The 'terrorists'
According to the Council on Foreign Relations, a U.S. think tank, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement is "a small, militant Muslim separatist group based in China's western Xinjiang province."
The group seeks the creation of an independent, Muslim state of East Turkestan, which would border Afghanistan and Pakistan. Chinese officials have linked the group to over 200 terror attacks and have been cracking down on them.
Eric Margolis, an expert on terrorism, says that China is "stretching the truth" by calling the group an Islamic terrorist group.
He told Newsnet that in 1949, China took over the independent state of East Turkestan when it annexed Tibet. Many of people in that area, which is now western China, have been fighting ever since to regain their independence, he added.
"It's not an Islamic group, that's a mischaracterization," Margolis said. "It's primarily a nationalist group."
He added that the group was backed by the CIA in the 1990s but was cut loose and declared a terrorist group by the United States after 9/11.
Chao said that the Chinese government has been trying to keep this issue out of the headlines.
"A lot of this has been kept under a tight lid," Chao said. "The Chinese government has not wanted people to look at how hard they are cracking down on this extremist group."
"Many human rights groups have accused the government of human right abuses in this crackdown."
Chinese-Canadian citizen Huseyin Celil was arrested in Uzebekistan and turned over to China, which has linked him to the East Turkestan Islamic Movement.
Celil has been jailed and is facing a life sentence. The case has become an irritant between Canada and China, as Prime Minister Stephen Harper criticized the Chinese government over the Celil case.
Harper said there was no credible evidence that Celil participated in terrorism.
With files from The Associated Press
