8 Killed in China Bombings

Eight people were killed today in a dozen suicide bomb attacks on government buildings by Muslim separatists in China's restive western Xinjiang province, Reuters reports. The homemade grenade attacks and police shootout rocked the small village of Kuga, some 2,000 miles from Beijing, at dawn. Almost all of the victims were believed to be bombers.

Chinese authorities have said that the separatists seeking an independent "East Turkestan" for Muslim Uighurs are a major security concern at the Olympics. It was the second attack in Xinjiang province in a week by the same suspected group. An earlier bombing killed 16 border police. A Chinese official said the separatists "want to use the platform of the Olympics to amplify the effects" of their violence. (More China stories.)