Editor's Note: Some of our readers have suggested that we publish a more balanced view of the riots in Urumqi and the response by the Chinese government. This report reflects the position of the Chinese government.

- Les Blough, Editor

The riot in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on July 5 frequently made the western media headlines. Some reports held partial and hostile recounts of the deadly riot, and even fabricated facts and confused truth and falsehood to attack China, with unfaithful pictures, videos and words that were carefully chosen so as to mislead the international readers. They even followed reports without live interviews or first hand materials. With such behavior, they apparently violate the basic principle of journalism.

Countries may face domestic conflict, or sometimes extreme events. It goes against the basic principle of human morals to show sympathy to those who sabotaged social stability and exercised the act of violence, and who turned a blind eye to the innocent civilian casualties. In light of global terrorism, if interfering with other countries internal affairs and treating mass media as a political tool become the normality it would cause great harm to all parties involved.

The following example can best expose the double-standards and the so-called objectivity of western media.

	The truth	Reports by western media
Who incited and plotted Xinjiang riot?	Evidence showed the riot was organized. It was instigated and masterminded by the World Uyghur Congress led by Kadeer. The Congress used the June 26 factory brawl between Uygur and Han ethnic workers in Guangdong Province, in which two Uygurs died, to create chaos. On July 1, the Congress held a special meeting, plotting to instigate unrest by sending messages via the Internet, telephones and mobile phones. On July 4, some people inside the country began to send out a flood of online posts encouraging people to go to the Renmin Square in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, to protest on July 5 to support separatists abroad. At 1:06 a.m. July 5, police in Urumqi were tipped off that some people were putting out illegal information calling for an illegal gathering at Renmin Square at 7 p.m. July 5. According to recordings of calls, at 11 a.m. July 5, Kadeer said, as she called her younger brother in Urumqi, "A lot of things have happened, and we all know something might happen in Urumqi tomorrow night." On July 6, Kadeer held an emergency meeting with some senior members of the Congress to make plans to further stir up both domestic and overseas demonstrations and to call for intervention from foreign governments and human rights institutions. Their schemes were immediately materialized in the attack on China's consulate in Munich, Germany, on Monday morning and the violence done by over 150 separatists in front of China's embassy in the Netherlands that afternoon.	"Kadeer told reporters she called her brother when she learned of the violence in Urumqi to warn her 40 relatives in the region to stay away from the demonstrations. Reuters: Exiled Uighur leader rejects China riot accusations. " "'A call I made to my brother does not mean I organized the whole event,' she said." They were not violent as the Chinese government has accused. They were not rioters or separatists," she said." "'Whatever happens in Tibet, the Chinese authorities are quick to point the finger at the Dalai Lama, His Holiness, as the source and instigator of the problems there, and so it is with me as well,' said Kadeer. " Reuters: Exiled Uighur leader rejects China riot accusations
		"'I'm against all violence. I have not done this and I will not do such a thing,' she said next to the congressmen." AFP: US lawmakers rally behind Uighur leader
		Although she knew about the Urumchi protests before they began, Kadeer said she had no role in organizing them. She told McClatchy that she'd heard about the plans from her daughters in the U.S. who'd seen announcements of demonstrations in Urumqi on popular Uighur Web sites. McClatchy: Under attack by China, Uighur activist denounces violence
How did western media cheat on death toll in Xinjiang riot?	Death toll from Urumqi riot rises to 184 The death toll from the riot in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, rose to 184 as of 11 p.m. Friday, the information office of the regional government said. Among the dead, 137 were Han people, including 111 men and 26 women. Forty-six were Uygur people, including 45 men and one woman. A man of Hui nationality also died. Number of injured in Urumqi riot increases to 1,680 The number of people injured in the Urumqi violence on July 5 has risen to 1,680 as of Sunday, according to the government of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. A total of 939 of the injured are hospitalized, said regional government chairman Nur Berkri in a televised speech Sunday afternoon. Altogether 216 of the hospitalized are seriously injured and 74 of them are on the verge of death. A total of 627 vehicles, including buses, vans, police cars, were smashed and torched in the deadly violence and 184 of them were seriously damaged. He said as of Sunday, 633 construction units, with a total area of 21,353 square meters, had been damaged in the violence. There are 291 shops among the damaged houses. Twenty-nine of them, covering a floor area of 13,769 square meters, were razed by fire. Most of them were big supermarkets.	"In Rome, a Germany-based Uighur leader, Erkin Alptekin, told The Associated Press that 'our countrymen in China' reported that 600-800 Uighurs were killed in the past few days and 3,000 were arrested. 'We were told (by fellow Uighurs) that 140 were dead on the spot' on Sunday and that their bodies were tossed into trucks and taken away by Chinese security forces, said Alptekin, who briefed the human rights commission in the Italian parliament. 'When the Uighurs heard the people were fired upon, parents all came out looking for their sons and daughters,' he said, adding that security forces started to 'disperse them by force, then started to beat them, tear gas them and shoot them.'" AP: Chinese troops flood streets after riots "Rebiya Kadeer, president of the pro-independence World Uyghur Congress, has said at least 500 people were killed while other overseas groups have put the toll even higher, citing accounts from Uighurs in China." AP: After violence, western China looks for answers
		"Officials say 156 people - mostly Han - died in Sunday's violence. Uighur groups say many more have died, claiming 90% of the dead were Uighurs." BBC : China leaders vow Xinjiang action
		"Chinese state media says that 184 people died, most of them Han, when Uighurs 'rioted' on Sunday.But Kadeer alleged that the death toll could be in the thousands, saying she has heard accounts of "mob killings" across the vast region which Uighurs call East Turkestan. " AFP: US lawmakers rally behind Uighur leader
		She told McClatchy that she estimated there were around 400 deaths, compared with 156 reported by Chinese officials. "Usually in such tragic events, the government tries to downplay the numbers," Kadeer said, citing information from sources in China . McClatchy: Under attack by China, Uighur activist denounces violence
Violent crime or "peaceful protest"?	People gather in Urumqi, attack passers-by and burn vehicles An unknown number of people gathered Sunday afternoon in Urumqi, capital of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, attacking passers-by and setting fire to vehicles. They also turned over traffic guardrail and interrupted traffic on some roads in the city. Police have rushed to the site to maintain order. Death toll in Xinjiang riot rises to 140 (July 6) According to police report, in the early hours on Sunday, the police department of Urumqi was tipped that information was spreading on Internet forums, calling for demonstrations at the People's Square and South Gate at 7 p.m. Sunday. At 6:20 p.m., more than 100 people gathered at there. Violence began around 8 p.m., when some rioters started beating pedestrians and smash buses on Heping Road. The violence soon spread to many other downtown areas. "It was like a war zone here, with many bodies of ethnic Han people lying on the road," said Huang Yabo, deputy director of the Urumqi Public Security Bureau. Two workers of a scorched massage house on Yan'an Road were beaten to death. Fourteen people along the road said they were homeless. A witness said an injured person was lying under the Tuanjie Road viaduct, bleeding, late Sunday night. On another street, a woman lay dead, with a bag on her back. On Xinhua South Road, a sedan and a truck were overthrown. Their windows were smashed and doors deformed. Rioters also set fire to a large hotel near the office building of the regional foreign trade department.	"'This anger has been growing for a long time,' said Dilxat Raxit, a spokesman for the World Uyghur Congress in exile in Sweden.'It began as a peaceful assembly. There were thousands of people shouting to stop ethnic discrimination, demanding an explanation ... They are tired of suffering in silence.'" Reuters: China calls Xinjiang riot a plot against its rule
		"Like last year's Tibet clashes, the Xinjiang unrest was rooted in a peaceful demonstration, this one centered around a demand for justice for two Uighur factory workers killed during a fight last month with their Han Chinese co-workers in southern China. Violence broke out Sunday after police showed up to disperse a crowd of between 1,000 to 3,000 demonstrators in the provincial capital, Urumqi." AP: Xinjiang riots echo last year's Tibet unrest
		"People speaking for the Uighurs said the protest was a peaceful one, and that police had fired on them." BBC: Many people killed and hurt in China riots
		"She said that security forces used deadly force on peaceful protests Sunday, triggering the backlash in which thousands of Han Chinese took to the streets with meat cleavers and other makeshift weapons vowing vengeance." AFP: US lawmakers rally behind Uighur leader

It is an out-and-out violence by ruthless means but has been prettified as peace petitions; it is an apparent massacre of innocent civilians by mobs but has been distorted as a "bloody suppression" by police; it is a distinct, clear-cut act of justice for maintaining public order but has been smeared as an "armed crackdown".

It is an out-and-out violence by ruthless means but has been prettified as peace petitions; it is an apparent massacre of innocent civilians by mobs but has been distorted as a "bloody suppression" by police；it is a distinct, clear-cut act of justice for maintaining public order but has been smeared as an "armed crackdown".

"Iron-clad proof" evidence of what happened has been obtained, and overseas media have reported from the scene the testimony of eyewitnesses since the July 5th bloody riots occurred in the capital of Urumqi, northwest China's Xinjiang autonomous region. However, there are still some people bent on to alter the character of the incident arbitrarily and distort facts intentionally.

Rioters set fire to cars, stores and residences alike along streets, stopped passers-by to beat them up; there was an endless brutality, mingled with crowd's shout of "killing them"… These represent true scenes in the Urumqi riots on July 5, and are there such "peace petitions" around the world?

To date, 184 people have reportedly died in the riots, most of whom were Han ethnicity, China's leading ethnic group, and more than 1,000 others, who were injured in violence, are now lying in hospital beds. Perpetrators beat up people and committed murder, arson and looting, and injured innocent civilians, including the elderly and disadvantageous, children and women. These are precisely the most horrendous crimes, and how can any country on earth tolerate such kind of "peaceful protests"?

Such criminal acts have nothing to do with ethnic habits or customs, religious beliefs and way of life, since they violate the common ethnical value of a modern society by rule of law and the entire humanity at large. In any society, rioters must be punished according to law and, otherwise, dignity in law will be downtrodden, the social order undermined, and the citizens' personal rights will be infringed upon, and the core value concept of the humanity be challenged.

In fact, any such lie can be exposed with slight common sense. Recently, a Chinese student made spokesman for the German-based World Uighur Conference tongue-tied with a specific detail he recognized from a photo. The spokesman asserted that a group of civilians were shot to death by armed police. And the student, however, pointed to the photo taken from rioting scene on July 5 and said the photo had clearly shown that those killed in street were hit head by rocks, and their throats were cut instead of "being shot by police".

Some false reports in Western media have made readers in Western countries feel resentful and even dissatisfied. An American netizen queried the New York Times why its journalists had not reported on the loss of human lives and widespread property damage in the bloody riots, whereas a French reader residing in Shanghai asked whether the riots could be termed as "peaceful protest" if it killed one's wife or husband and hence voiced great disappointment with Western media.

Lying poses the second-strike murder of innocent victims in the post-riot days. Lies, just as atrocities, trample on social justice and ravage the human conscience. Any moves to confound black and white and fabricate evidence or any words to "whitewash" atrocities and prettify mobs are the same as going on to persecute the innocent victims.

Any liars have their sinister schemes, and the exposure of such conspiracies will help people come to see the truth. With regard to Rebiya Kadeer and her "World Uighur Congress", people can tell their evil intention from their dirty tricks and despicable gimmicks. As for some Western media, people would surely experience or have a "taste" of the political bias and cultural arrogance behind the self-styled objective and fair reporting from their deep-rooted stubbornness, distorted reportage and inflammatory remarks.

By People's Daily Online and contributed by PD reporter He Zhenhua

By People's Daily Online