Backlash Over Chinese Handling of Muslim Minority

"The truth of the matter is al Qaeda welcomes any group that went to Afghanistan and offers to support it," he said.

And while al Qaeda leaders might have sought support from Uighurs, they never extended their reach into China, said Kiriakou. "The Uighurs are fighting that lonely fight by themselves," he said.

China's northwest region of Xinjiang, dominated by the Turkic Muslim Uighur population, has long been in opposition to the ruling Communist Party. The region had a brief period of independence before the Chinese Communist Party came to power in 1949 and settled the region with majority Han Chinese.

Inspired by the Tibetan independence movement in the 1990s, Uighur resentment bubbled up: while many separatists were non-violent, others launched sometimes fatal attacks.

Though the groups never embraced the spectacular displays of terror that have been the trademark of groups like al-Qaeda, China's repression of religion and culture in Xinjiang has affected even the most moderate Uighurs there, human rights groups say. Children and Communist Party members are prohibited from attending mosques, and the traditional role of imams has been usurped by the Party leadership, according to human rights groups and U.S. State Department reports.

Yet the Chinese government has continued to paint its fight against Uighur groups as part of the international war on terror -- a strategy, many experts say, intended to garner international support for its actions.

Chinese authorities say they have made dozens of arrests of terrorists within its borders this year. According to state-run media, authorities have broken up rallies, executed Uighurs suspected of terrorism, and closed down mosques.

In particular, Chinese authorities have identified a group called the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM) as the greatest terror threat in China. After two Uighurs killed 16 border police in the western Chinese city of Kashgar this week, authorities there said that the suspects' homemade guns and weapons resembled those seized from an ETIM training camp last year.