Despite harsh restrictions on media and Internet in the western Chinese province of Xinjiang, wire services report continuing clashes between Han and Uighur residents of Urumqi in the wake of violence July 5 that left some 150 dead. Riot police used tear gas to disperse mobs armed with pipes and sticks. Han youth chanting "defend the country" attempted to invade Uighur neighborhoods, seeking retribution for the previous day's violence. In Hong Kong, Human Rights Watch Asia researcher Phelim Kine said the Chinese government needs to bring in an "international investigator from the United Nations to try to determine what exactly happened on Sunday and what were the reasons for it." (NY Daily News, BBC News, VOA, July 7)

Over 150 are dead and some 1,000 injured following what China's state media call ethnic clashes between Uighurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang province. The riots began late July 5 in Urumqi, the provincial capital, following a protest march by Uighurs in response the death of two Uighur workers in a mob attack at a toy factory in Guangdong province June 26. After the march was attacked by security forces, protesters torched vehicles and attacked shops. Authorities say Uighur mobs attacked Han residents. Police have conducted raids and arrested several hundred in Urumqi.

Kyrgyzstan has struck a deal with the US to keep open the Pentagon's Manas for a sum of $180 million. Washington had been haggling to keep the base open since February, when the Kyrgyz government announced its closure after securing pledges of $2 billion in aid and credit from Russia. Now, an unnamed diplomatic source has told Reuters that Moscow brokered the new Manas deal with Washington. A Kremlin official accompanying Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Egypt told the news agency: "Kyrgyzstan agreed its decision with Russia. We support all steps aimed at stabilizing the situation in Afghanistan."

The trial opened this week for respected Tibetan lama who faces 15 years in prison on a weapons possession charge. Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche, who headed the Pangri nunnery in Ganzi Prefecture of Sichuan Province, was arrested on May 18 after over 80 nuns from his and another nunnery staged a peaceful protest march to the town. Police claim to have found a pistol and more than 100 bullets and cartridges under a bed in Rinpoche's room—a charge the lama denies.

After Turkmenistan accused the Russian state energy company Gazprom of causing a pipeline explosion by giving less than a day's notice before abruptly cutting its imports, observers see heightened tension between Moscow and Ashgabat. Dimitri Alexandrov, an analyst for the investments company Financial Bridge, said "that kind of explosion can only happen when the pipes are defective.... [T]he tone of the Turkmenistani Foreign Minister's accusation suggests that this is a political issue."

The Lhasa Intermediate People's Court in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), April 8 sentenced two Tibetans to death on charges relating to "starting fatal fires," according to an official report. These are the first known death sentences passed against Tibetans in connection with the Lhasa riots of March 2008. Two other Tibetans were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve and one other was sentenced to life imprisonment in a total of three separate cases of arson, reportedly involving the deaths of seven people.

In the first major Tibetan protests since last year's Lhasa uprising, hundreds of local residents in Ragya township, Golog "Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture," Qinghai province, attacked a police station March 22, leading to the arrest of nearly 100 monks from the Ragya Monastery. Some 2,000 ethnic Tibetans took to the streets of Ragya after word spread that a monk had taken his own life after being arrested for possession of "separatist" literature. Authorities said several police were "slightly injured" in the clash.

Opposition parties this week called for protests across Kyrgyzstan on March 27, amid worsening economic conditions and mounting accusations of government repression. President Kurmanbek Bakiyev's government has authorized the rally—but Interior Minister Moldomusa Kongantiyev issued a grim warning. "At the slightest breach of the law, the police will take every measure to restore law and order and the security of our citizens," Kongantiyev said.