ISIL fighters from China’s Uighur ethnic minority have vowed to return home and “shed blood like rivers” in what security experts said marked the first such threat against Chinese targets.

The threat came in a half-hour video released Monday by a division of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) featuring fighters from China’s Uighur minority, said the US-based SITE Intelligence Group, which analysed the footage.

China has for years blamed exiled Uighur “separatists” for a series of violent attacks in its western Xinjiang region – the Muslim Uighur homeland – and warned of the potential for them to link up with violent groups.

In the video, a Uighur fighter issued the threat against China just before executing an alleged informant.

“Oh, you Chinese who do not understand what people say. We are the soldiers of the Caliphate, and we will come to you to clarify to you with the tongues of our weapons, to shed blood like rivers and avenging the oppressed,” according to SITE’s translation.

The footage also showed fighters, including heavily armed children, giving speeches, praying, and killing other “informants”. Tiếp tục đọc “ISIL video threatens China with ‘rivers of bloodshed’” →