Two members of a terrorist gang were killed and 15 others were arrested during a raid last month by police in Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the Beijing-based Global Times reported yesterday.

It is the largest terrorist group to be broken by police for over a year, the paper said.

Five policemen were injured during the raid on Jan 27 when three homemade grenades were thrown at them, the newspaper reported. The terrorists had been undertaking training exercises and assembling explosives at a rented house in the city, it said.

Guns, homemade explosives and training materials were discovered in the house following the raid. Police said they also found evidence linking the gang to terrorist groups abroad.

The arrested members have all pleaded guilty to the charges, the newspaper reported.

The raid was the latest in a series of efforts by the local government to crack down on violent activities by Uygur separatists who have carried out several terrorist acts since the 1990s.

In January last year, police killed 18 terrorists in a gun battle in Xinjiang. One officer was also killed and another wounded in the raid in the mountains of the Pamirs plateau in the southern region.

(China Daily February 19, 2008)