China: 8,000 New Police Officers Will Be Sent to Patrol Uighur Region
The New York Times, 30 January 2012
The government will send thousands of police officers to rural villages in the northwestern region of Xinjiang amid concern about religious extremism in the heavily Muslim area, state media reported Monday. Xinhua, the state news agency, reported that 8,000 officers would be recruited so that every village in Xinjiang would have at least one officer on patrol. It said they would help manage migrants and crack down on illegal religious activities. Xinjiang is home to the Muslim Uighur ethnic group. Long-simmering resentment among Uighurs over rule by the Han Chinese majority and influxes of migrants has sporadically erupted into violence.