Three men executed in China over railway station knife attack that left 31 dead
The trio were convicted of organising the assault in March last year, in which 31 people were killed. A woman who took part in the killings was given a life sentence
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 24 March, 2015, 3:46pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 24 March, 2015, 4:25pm
Associated Press in Beijing
The three men executed for knife attack, with Patigul Tohti, top left, who was sentenced to life in prison. Photo: SCMP Pictures
The authorities in southwest China on Tuesday executed three men convicted of masterminding a knife attack a year ago that killed 31 people outside a railway station in Kunming.
A notice from the Kunming City Intermediate People’s Court said Iskandar Ehet, Turgun Tohtunyaz and Hasayn Muhammad were put to death after China’s Supreme Court upheld their convictions for the crimes of murder and organising and leading a terrorist organisation.
Five knife-wielding assailants hacked 31 people to death and injured 141 on March 1 last year, an act of violence that shook the country as tensions between the Uygur Muslim minority and the majority Han ethnic group spread beyond the Uygur homeland of Xinjiang.
Four of the assailants were shot dead at the scene and the fifth, a pregnant woman, Patigul Tohti, was captured alive and later sentenced to life in prison on the charges of joining a terror group and murder.
The authorities said Ehet, Tohtunyaz and Muhammad were arrested two days before the attack while attempting to flee across the Chinese border. Having lost contact with the three men, the other five members of the group mounted the attack as planned, the Kunming court said.
Beijing has blamed Uygur separatists and religious fanatics for a spate of recent violence that has caused hundreds of deaths over the past year.
Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the Germany-based World Uygur Congress, said he did not believe the defendants had a fair trial.
“China is evading the root cause for the problem through the political means of the death sentence,” Dilxat Raxit said. “The defendants were not granted a dignified trial.”
Critics say heavy-handed Chinese rule and economic disenfranchisement have pushed some Uygurs towards extremism.
