Upheaval in China.

There appears to have been a rather large-scale massacre in China. I say appears because as seems to be their standard response to civil unrest, internet and mobile phone service have been cut of to the area, leaving the reports rather thin.

It appears that at least 140 people are dead and over 800 injured, largely in inter-ethnic violence. That is not a short violent riot, that is massive civil unrest. Until the world's media is allowed access to eyewitnesses we have only the official version to say what happened, and you'll forgive me I hope for not just taking the word of a dictatorial, authoritarian post-maoist government at face value.

The part that really starts to get tedious is that old response that totalitarian governments always bring out when faced with dissent:

"The Xinjiang government blamed separatist Uighurs based abroad for orchestrating attacks on ethnic Han Chinese."

It's never actually the people being angry, you see, after all everything is paradise within the nirvana that is China, Iran, Burma/yanmar or wherever. And so the government casts around and finds that the CIA, the BBC, the Russians, the Jews, or as in this case the exiles. And that's just lazy. Nobody believes it really: the people accused know they didn't do it; the people involved in the dissent know the real reason they are involved; spectators, journalists and other leaders around the world are unconvinced; and the Gorvernment sure as hell knows they made it up. So wouldn't it be nice, just for a change if dictators could start being honest?