'Terrorist threat' forces China plane to land

A plane was forced to make an emergency landing when it received an "anonymous terrorist threat" after taking off from China's restive northwestern Xinjiang region on Monday, state media said. The plane landed at an airport in Lanzhou, capital of China's northwest province of Gansu following the alert at around 1730 (0930 GMT), state-run news agency Xinhua said, quoting the airline and local security sources. The CZ680 China Southern Airlines flight had originally taken off from Istanbul in Turkey, before its scheduled arrival at Xinjiang's provincial capital, Urumqi. It was en route for Beijing when the alert happened. Domestic reports said the plane was a Boeing 757 which had 186 passengers and 10 crew on board. Pictures posted online showed the plane stationary on the tarmac of the airport, with the luggage offloaded and being checked by security personnel and sniffer dogs. The reports gave no further details, and did not say who had made the "terrorist threat". Similar incidents on Chinese planes are rare, although a year ago a plane bound for Urumqi was forced into an emergency landing after a passenger claimed there was a bomb on board, Police detained the 27-year-old woman passenger after she threatened to detonate a bomb during the China United Airlines flight from Beijing to Urumqi. She told police she had a problem with her boyfriend and was flying to Xinjiang to talk to him, state media said. Xinjiang -- a resource-rich and strategically vital region that borders eight countries -- is home to roughly nine million Turkic-speaking Uighurs who have long bridled under what many see as government oppression. An influx of ethnic Han Chinese has fueled anger, with some Uighurs complaining that Han get better jobs and pay and saying traditional Uighur culture is being deliberately diluted. Two years ago, bloody ethnic riots in Urumqi killed 197 people and injured around 1,700. Beijing has blamed much of Xinjiang's unrest on the "three forces" of extremism, separatism and terrorism. The incident comes at a particularly sensitive time for China's leaders, who are preparing for a generational handover of power which is set to commence at the 18th Communist Party Congress, which begins in Beijing on November 8.