TIMES ONLINE: Padlocks secured the iron grill gates to mosques across the city of Urumqi this morning as Muslim Uighurs were told to stay home and pray.
Officials have notified all mosques in the city, where 156 people were killed and more than 1,000 injured when minority Muslim Uighurs rampaged through the streets baying for the blood of Han Chinese last weekend, that today's noon prayers must be cancelled.
At the Say Bag District Mosque, security officials sat in the shaded entrance behind the locked gates, some had electric truncheons on the table in front of them in case of renewed violence. A notice on an entrance pillar asked people to worship at home today and to stay away.
Prayers were cancelled, it said: “Because of the complicated situation at the moment and to safeguard the security of the Muslim masses and to protect the property of the mosque and so as to give no opportunity to violent terrorists.”
It concluded: “We hope the Muslim masses will understand this and will notify each other.” >>> Jane Macartney in Urumqi | Friday, July 10, 2009
