Who was said to have coordinated the protests?
Demonstrations began on the evening of 5 July with a protest in the Grand Bazaar, a prominent tourist site, and crowd reportedly gathering at the People's Square area. The demonstration began peacefully, and official and eyewitness accounts reported that it involved about 1,000 Uyghurs; the WUC said approximately 10,000 protesters took part.On 6 July, XUAR chairman Nur Bekri presented an official timeline of the previous day's events, according to which more than 200 demonstrators gathered in People's Square in Ürümqi at about 5 p.m. local time, and about 70 of their leaders were detained. Later, a crowd gathered in the mostly Uyghur areas of South Jiefang Road, Erdaoqiao, and Shanxi Alley; by 7:30 p.m., more than one thousand were gathered in front of a hospital in Shanxi Alley. At about 7:40 p.m., more than 300 people blocked the roads in the Renmin Road and Nanmen area. According to Bekri, rioters began to smash buses at 8:18 p.m., after police "controlled and dispersed" the crowd.How the demonstrations became violent is unclear. Some say the police used excessive force against the protesters; the World Uyghur Congress quickly issued press releases saying that the police had used deadly force and killed "scores" of protesters. Kadeer has alleged that there were agents provocateurs among the crowds. Others claim that the protesters initiated the violence; for example, an Uyghur eyewitness cited by The New York Times said protesters began throwing rocks at the police. The government's official line was that the violence was not only initiated by the protesters, but also had been premeditated and coordinated by Uyghur separatists abroad. The local public security bureau said it found evidence that many Uyghurs had travelled from other cities to gather for the riot, and that they had begun preparing weapons two or three days before the riot.
Uyghur separatists