At least 16 Chinese border guards were killed and an equal number injured on Monday when suspected Uighur separatists rammed a dump truck into a patrol station and threw grenades at it in the restive northwestern Xinjiang region, raising security fears four days before the Olympics.The incident took place at around 8 a.m. (0530 IST) when two attackers drove the truck to hit policemen who were jogging during a morning exercise in Kashi, police said.Fourteen policemen were killed on the spot and two others died on the way to hospital, the Xinhua news agency reported.The attack on policemen in Xinjiang Autonomous Region was suspected as a "terrorist plot", police said.The two attackers got off the lorry after the vehicle veered to hit on a roadside wire pole, Xinhua said, adding they threw two grenades to the barracks, causing explosion.The attackers also hacked the policemen with knives before they were arrested, police said, adding one of the attackers got a leg injury in the raid.The regional public security department had got clues suggesting that the "East Turkistan Islamic Movement" planned to make terrorist attacks during August 1-8, just ahead of the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing, Xinhua said.Oil-rich Xinjiang that borders Central Asia has about 8.3 million Uighurs, many unhappy with what they say has been six decades of repressive Chinese rule and fighting Beijing to establish a separate state called 'East Turkistan'.China has repeatedly warned of terrorist threat emanating from Xinjiang, saying the separatists militants there were planning to attack the Olympics scheduled from August eight to 24.The rights groups and members of the ethnic Muslim Uighur population in Xinjiang have accused the Chinese government of exaggerating the threat as cover to crackdown on all forms of dissent.China has deployed more than 100,000 security personnel to provide security for the Games.Eastern Turkistan Movement was listed as a terrorist group by the UN in 2002 with alleged links to al Qaeda. Beijing recently said it had smashed five terrorist groups plotting attacks on Olympics and arrested 82 terrorists linked to them in the first six months of this year.Chinese police had also claimed to have destroyed 41 Islamic military training bases from January to June and busted 12 terrorist cells of overseas-based outfits in the restive Muslim-populated Xinjiang region.
