156 Dead in Riots in Xinjiang

A boy stands amidst the burnt wreckage of a bus and stalls in Urumqi, China on Monday after violent riots took over the city. (PETER PARKS/AFP/Getty Images)

Thousands Chinese security troops are moving into the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China after days of ethnic rioting and conflict has left at least 156 civilians dead.

The conflict started on Sunday when a protest by ethnic Uyghurs over the stalled investigation into the death of two factory workers got out of hand, and Uyghurs started attacking ethnic Han Chinese residents and businesses.

Chinese residents have also attacked Uyghers using kitchen knives, bats and steel bars. Over 1,000 have been injured in the conflict. Police forces have been sent to prevent more bloodshed.

Both Han Chinese and Uyghurs have fled the region, and thousands of Uyghurs have been arrested.

In the Washington Post yesterday, reporter Ariana Eunjung Cha recounted this scene:

At lunchtime on Tuesday at one end of the Uighur quarter, where stores and restaurants had just reopened, things looked almost normal with people running their daily errands when at around 1:50 p.m. word spread through phone calls, text messages and people driving past in cars that "The Han are coming!" Within minutes, the place emptied as entire blocks of people ran in different directions. On a bridge in a Han area a half-hour later, people began to flee when a man raced across and shouted, "The Uighurs are coming!"

Here's hoping the violence ends soon. But it will take a whole lot more than military action to calm the deep anger that both groups harbor for each other.