'Hijack attempt foiled' in China's Xinjiang 
 
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 Crew and passengers foiled a hijack attempt by six people on a plane in the restive Xinjiang region, Chinese state media and an official say. 
 
 The Tianjin Airlines plane had just taken off from Hotan and was bound for Urumqi when the incident occurred. 
 
 It returned to the airport and the suspects were detained, a statement on the region's official news portal said. 
 
 A spokeswoman for the Xinjiang regional government said the hijackers were men from the Uighur minority group. 
 
 Hou Hanmin told the BBC that the group tried to break into the cockpit using a broken crutch as a weapon but were overpowered by passengers and crew. 
 
 At least seven passengers and crew were injured, she said. 
 
 No details were available on the alleged hijackers' motives or identities, she added, and police were "still investigating" whether they had any other weapons. 
 
 Almost half of Xinjiang's residents are Uighurs, a Muslim minority group with cultural and ethnic links to Central Asia. 
 
 Uighur allegations of discrimination and marginalisation have been behind anti-Han Chinese and separatist sentiment in the restive region since the 1990s. 
 
 In 2009, riots erupted in Xinjiang in which nearly 200 people died after tensions flared between the Uighur and Han Chinese communities. 
 
 Since then, there have been sporadic attacks and clashes, including an attack on a Hotan police station in July 2011 that left several people dead. ||||| Passengers and crew foiled a hijacking attempt by six people on a plane in China's restive far-western Xinjiang region Friday, a regional airline and state media said. 
 
 The attempt was made just after the plane took off from Hotan in southern Xinjiang for the regional capital of Urumqi and the six suspects were detained after the plane returned safely, the Tianshan regional government's news portal said. 
 
 Tianjin Airlines said on its website that the plane returned to Hotan 22 minutes after takeoff. 
 
 Tianshan's report did not give further details, such as how the hijacking was foiled, how many passengers were on the plane or what was known about the suspects' motive or ethnicity. 
 
 Hotan has been the scene of recent clashes between ethnic Uighurs (pronounced WEE'-gurs) and authorities. The Uighurs say they resent government controls on their religion and culture. 
 
 The government says China faces an organized terrorist threat from radical Muslim groups in the region and that it has invested heavily to raise living standards in Xinjiang. 
 
 The phone listed for Hotan police rang unanswered Friday. A man who identified himself as a police officer and gave only his family name Wang at Xinjiang Department of Public Security said no more information on the hijacking attempt was available. 
 
 In 2008, state media reported that a Uighur woman made an unsuccessful attempt to hijack a passenger plane flying to Beijing from Urumqi. 
 
 In general, threats to civil aviation in China are believed to be rare.
– A hijacking attempt on a Chinese plane was foiled today by passengers and crew just after departure, the AP reports, citing state media. The Tianjin Airlines plane had taken off from the remote city of Hotan in the restive far-western region of Xinjiang, and returned there safely 22 minutes later. Six suspects were detained. Hotan has seen clashes recently between the authorities and Muslim Uighurs, who resent government control; the BBC reports that the hijackers were Uighur men. The men reportedly used a broken crutch as a weapon during their attempt to get into the cockpit. Two on-board guards were seriously injured as the hijackers were overpowered, while seven passengers and one flight attendant suffered minor injuries, Reuters reports. Pictures on Sina Weibo, China's popular microblogging site, showed one of the suspects being held down by passengers, with what appears to be blood on a nearby seat. Chinese officials say they foiled another hijacking plot by an Uighur woman in 2008.