Lying poses second-strike murder of innocent victims

• Source: People's Daily Online
• [15:56 July 15 2009]
• Comments

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.