The international community has continued to condemn the July 5 riots in Urumqi, the capital of China's northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, which has left 192 people dead.

Religious leaders and some experts also voiced support for the joint efforts by the Chinese government and various ethnic groups to safeguard ethnic unity and social stability.

Regional leaders of two major Islamic organizations -- Nahdatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah -- in the Indonesian city of Surabaya said Islam advocates peace and opposes violence.

Muslims love peace, pursue peace and take real actions to maintain peace and oppose any violent and terrorist actions, they said Tuesday while meeting Wang Huagen, Chinese general consulate in Surabaya, Indonesia's second largest city.

The two Islamic leaders also expressed the hope that social order in Urumqi could be restored soon.

Pierre Picard, a human geologist and China expert at the University of Paris, said he was shocked by the July 5 incident which was a violent crime orchestrated by foreign terrorists and separatist forces.

China has the right to take actions to maintain national stability and restore social order and the measures it has taken were appropriate, he told Xinhua.

No country in the world can tolerate attacks by terrorist forces, he added.

The Al-Riyadh newspaper, one of the leading newspapers in Saudi Arabia, said in a report on Tuesday that the July 5 incident in Xinjiang was a crime of violence that was premeditated and organized.

The unrest was not an ethnic issue nor a religious one, but a case against public order incited by a few separatists and mobs, it stressed.

Bahrain's Al-Ayam newspaper shared the view. In a report published on Tuesday, it said the incident was by no means an ethnic or religious issue, but a grave violent crime involving beating, smashing, looting and burning premeditated, organized and instigated by the separatist forces both in and outside China.

The purpose of the separatists is to sabotage ethnic unity and social stability in Xinjiang, said the report.

The local government of the autonomous region has adopted effective measures in accordance with law to stop the violent crimes in a bid to safeguard social stability and resume normal social order as well as protect local people's rights and interests, it said.

The report said that the Chinese government had introduced and carried out a series of ethnic and religious policies since the People's Republic of China was established.

China always sticks to the principle of protecting ethnic minorities equal rights and safeguarding ethnic solidarity, and is firmly opposed to ethnic discrimination and oppression of any ethnic group as well as any activities aimed at undermining ethnic unity, it said.

China has always valued the role played by Islamic countries and attached great importance to its friendly relations with them, the report said, adding that such relations will be further cemented through joint efforts by both sides.

(Xinhua News Agency July 16, 2009)