ALMATY -- Uyghurs in Kazakhstan have held a commemoration for the victims of ethnic clashes in the neighboring Uyghur Autonomous Region in Xinjiang, China, RFE/RL's Kazakh Service reports.
Hundreds of ethnic Uyghurs gathered at a mosque in Almaty for the commemoration ceremony that ended the 40-day mourning period announced by leaders of Kazakhstan's Uyghurs on July 10.
Speaking during the ceremony, the deputy chairman of the World Congress of Uyghurs, Kaharman Kozhamberdiev, said that the Congress would keep on urging international human rights organizations to pursue independent investigations of the crackdown on a Uyghur protest in Urumchi on July 5, sparking days of rioting.
Chinese officials say that as a result of the clashes that began on July 5, over 190 people died and more than 1,600 were injured. Over 1,500 protestors were arrested later.
The World Congress of Uyghurs insists that the number of people killed, wounded, and arrested is actually much higher.