Twenty-one people were killed in an encounter between police and suspected extremists of the Uyghur community in China's troubled Xinjiang autonomous region, state run Xinhua news agency reported on Wednesday.
The victims included community workers, police personnel and the suspects.
The clashes erupted on Tuesday afternoon in Bachu county of Kashgar prefecture, when community workers informed the police about a terrorist hideout. The informants were held captive by the suspects, who killed police officers and community officials who confronted them.
The suspects burned the house and killed the hostages before they were shot dead by police.
Police arrested eight terror suspects, who reportedly admitted on interrogation that they were planning violent attacks on innocent victims.
But BBC quoted Dilxat Raxit, a spokesperson for the exile activist group World Uyghur Congress, as saying that the clashes were triggered by the Chinese "armed personnel," who killed a young Uyghur in a clean-up campaign against the ethnically Turkic Muslims.
Uyghurs, who constitute about 45 percent of the region's population, say they are suffering under government repression in Xinjiang. Uighur extremists, seeking autonomy for the region, are often jailed by the police on terrorism and separatism charges.
Uighurs' clash with Han Chinese immigrants in Xinjiang has made it a communal flash point in China.
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