China has installed about 40,000 high-definition surveillance cameras in the western region of Xinjiang days before the one-year anniversary of the country's worst ethnic violence in decades.
The security cameras with "riot-proof" protective shells will be monitored by police at more than 4,000 public locations, including on city streets and buses and in schools and shopping malls, city government spokesman Ma Xinchun said Friday.
Long-simmering tensions between Xinjiang's minority Uighurs and majority Han Chinese migrants turned into open violence in the streets of Urumqi — the capital of the traditionally Muslim region — last July. The government says 197 people were killed. Beijing blamed overseas Uighur (pronounced WEE-gur) groups of plotting the violence, but exile groups denied it.
China appeared caught by surprise a year ago when anger over a brawl between Uighurs and Han in another part of the country boiled over despite Xinjiang's typically high police presence and tight Internet monitoring. After the July 5 violence, the region's Internet, international telephone and text messaging links to the outside world were not restored for more than half a year.
In an unrelated story, the sales of ski masks are suddenly skyrocketing.
By: Brant
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