The New Great Game Round-Up #27

The Great Game Round-Up brings you the latest newsworthy developments regarding Central Asia and the Caucasus region. We document the struggle for influence, power, hegemony and profits between a U.S.-dominated NATO, its GCC proxies, Russia, China and other regional players.

Last Monday, China's famous Tiananmen Square became quite unexpectedly the scene of another tragic event. Three individuals drove an SUV with a Xinjiang license plate through a crowd of people. The horror ended when the car crashed and burst into flames. Two innocent bystanders were killed along with the three occupants of the vehicle and 40 people were injured. Chinese police later identified the SUV driver as Usmen Hasan and his two passengers as his mother Kuwanhan Reyim and his wife Gulkiz Gini. Doubts about the nature of this incident were quickly dispelled when police searched the SUV and rounded up several suspects in connection with the attack:

Police identify Tiananmen car crash as terrorist attack

Chinese police have identified Monday's deadly crash at downtown Beijing's Tiananman Square as a terrorist attack and five suspects have been detained.

Police found gasoline, equipment full of gasoline, two knives and steel sticks as well as a flag with extremist religious content in the jeep.

© Photo BBC

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