CHINA’s security agencies have successfully cracked the case involving a brutal railway station attack, and arrested three additional suspects behind the incident that left 29 people dead and more than 140 others injured, state media reported yesterday.

In a terse report, the official Xinhua news agency said it took officers from various law enforcement agencies about 40 hours to solve the case, which involved a total of eight assailants. They carried out a stabbing spree at the railway station in the south-western city of Kunming late last Saturday night, targeting innocent bystanders and travellers alike.

Two of the suspects were women, according to Xinhua. Police who confronted the assailants at the scene shot dead four of them and injured one of the women.

… Terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratna from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies said the “single most cruel terrorist incident in China” signals a turning point in the nation’s battle against terrorism.
“The threat is growing in Xinjiang, the ideology is spreading. People are increasingly motivated to mount attacks on the government… and they know they can hurt China more by attacking from outside Xinjiang.”