Netizens have criticized Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan for labeling the July 5 riots in Urumqi "a kind of genocide", urging him to stop interfering into other country's internal affairs.

Calling the Urumqi riots "unfortunate events", a Turkish netizen who identified himself as Turgut said Erdogan should stop poking his nose into other country's internal affairs and clean up his own back yard first.

"Let us try to save ourselves before saving others," he said in a post on the China Daily website (www.chinadaily.com.cn).

He questioned the prime minister for his motive. "What Mr. Erdogan was saying was no more than domestic populism and should be regarded as such."

Another Turkish reader, using the web name of Aydinlikci, also voiced opposition to Erdogan's remarks.

"As a Turk, I am definetaly against Erdogan's interpretations which support ethnic provocation in Xinjiang," he said in a post on the China Daily website. "Separatist movement in Xinjiang which is under the leadership of CIA-supported Rebiya Kadeer has not to be reinforced by Turkey."

He went on to cast doubts on Turkey's inconsistency in its stance on separatist terror.

"Although Turkey has been defending it's nation-state against USA-supported separatist terror, prime minister of Turkey encourages USA-supported ethnic separatist movements in other countries such as Russian Federation and People's Republic of China," the reader said in a post on China Daily website (www.chinadaily.com.cn).

An Australian netizen who called himself SHx also expressed his strong dissatisfaction with Erdogan.

"If the deaths of fewer than 50 Uyghurs amount to genocide, then the killings of 40 thousand Kurds by Turkey in the last 30 years is quadruple genocide plus," he said in a post on China Daily website.

"After that, words will fail to explain as to what the murder of 1.5 million Armenians could possibly be."

(China Daily July 15, 2009)