Police in China say they're still searching
for five assailants from a mass stabbing at
train station that has now claimed the lives
of at least 33 people.
Late Saturday night, more than 10 knife-wielding
attackers dressed in black slashed and stabbed
scores of people at a train station in Kunming,
the capital of China's Yunnan province.
The brutal attack wounded more than 130 people,
with fresh reports indicating at least 33
are now dead.
Chinese police shot dead four of the attackers,
three males and one female, and captured a
fifth assailant, which they say was a woman.
Chinese officials are describing the rampage
as an organized, premeditated act of terror
— claiming evidence from the crime scene
links the attack to separatists from the country's
northwest Xinjiang region.
In that region, a group known as Muslim Uighurs
are at odds with the government.
Uighurs are a Turkish ethnic minority very
different from China's Han majority, which
represents about 92 percent of the country's
total population.
Time explains: "While the Tibetan campaign
for autonomy gets more international attention,
Muslim Uighurs have also agitated against
what they say are decades of institutionalized
repression, such as limits on worship and
career opportunities."
And the resistance movement may be radicalizing.
Last year, violent confrontations between
Uighurs and Chinese security forces increased,
with more than 100 hundred people killed.
The group has been the target of blame by
officials for a string of recent terrorist
attacks.
Including one in Beijing's iconic Tiananmen
square, where Chinese police say a Uighur
man and his family drove a car into a crowd,
killing five people.
Investigators say they found separatist flags
inside the car, something Uighurs have called
into question given the fact the vehicle caught
fire during 
the incident.
A CNN correspondent says if the attack was
carried out by the group, it would be significant
because it is outside their area of stronghold.
"It would indicate an escalation of the terror
threat here in China for a country that is
very well known for having a very severe security
apparatus at times, and they were unable to
stop the carnage here."
