Let all "human rights" hypocrites shut up. No pretext can justify the heinous atrocities against innocent citizens in the Urumqi riot on Sunday.

The indiscriminate carnage turned Urumqi into a city of terror that night, leaving hundreds dead or injured without knowing why. No sane mind can stand the images of savage brutality brimming the TV screen. Skeletons of burnt vehicles, smashed and looted stores, helpless victims lying weltering in blood Our blood boils seeing the sanguinary mobs rampaging their way through the otherwise charming city.

That is crime against humanity.

Perpetrators must be ferreted out. Justice must be done. And a clear and loud message must be sent: This country has zero tolerance for ethnic hatred.

"Human rights" preachers and Uygur separatists have already stood facts on their heads, portraying the killing, burning, looting and smashing as a "peaceful" rally. As was evident throughout the March 14, 2008 unrest in Lhasa, such people don't mind lying when it serves their political ends.

Judging from information available thus far, the Urumqi riot was closely associated with instigation from overseas. Overseas Uygur separatists took advantage of the June 26 incident at a Guangdong toy factory where two Uygur workers were killed in a violent conflict between Uygur and other employees. That tragedy itself was the result of a malicious rumor.

Now, the instigators played on that rumor and used it to sow hostility between the Han and Uygur peoples.

On one hand, they wanted the Uygur mobsters to be "braver" and make "bigger" noises. On the other, they are again feigning innocence to swindle sympathy out of the uninformed overseas public.

Little doubt some people from their angry audience will be pointing fingers in wrong directions. But outside noises should not be allowed to influence law enforcement at home. We have our Criminal Law. And during the riots, criminal offenses took place.

Overseas Uygur instigators fanned up racial tensions on the grounds that the authorities "unfairly" handled the Shaoguan incident, packaging a common criminal case into one of racial confrontation. Which is groundless in itself, because investigation of the Shaoguan case is still underway. How can there be an "unfair" conclusion?

Yet their awkward tactic does reveal an insidious plot to poison relations between the Han and Uygur peoples. To that end, they will do everything to portray investigation of crimes as driven by what they termed as racial discrimination against the Uygurs.

Every citizen in this country should be equal under the law, no matter who he or she is. Uygur or not, those who committed crimes in the Urumqi rioting must be held accountable.

(China Daily July 8, 2009)