24 August 2014 Last updated at 04:46 ET
Police cars blocking off the roads leading into Tiananmen Square as smoke rises into the air after a vehicle loaded with petrol crashed in front of Tiananmen Gate in Beijing, 28 October 2013
The Tiananmen crash killed five people and injured 38 others
China has executed eight people in the north-western region of Xinjiang, for what it calls “terrorist” attacks, reports the state news agency Xinhua.
Three of those executed had been convicted of an attack in Tiananmen Square in Beijing last October, in which five people died, Xinhua said.
The others were found guilty of crimes including bomb-making and arson.
The government has accused separatist militants based in Xinjiang of carrying out a string of recent attacks.
Xinjiang is the traditional home of Muslim Uighurs, who speak a distinct language and have different customs to the majority Han population elsewhere in China.
‘Masterminds’
Huseyin Guxur, Yusup Wherniyas and Yusup Ehmet were “deprived of political rights for life” because of their role in the deadly car crash on Tiananmen Square in October 2013, Xinhua said.
“They masterminded the terrorist attack,” the news agency added.
In the incident, a car rammed into bystanders on the politically important Beijing square before bursting into flames.
Two tourists died, along with three of the attackers.
This screen grab taken from state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) footage shows eight prisoners (in orange and brown) standing at attention upon their arrival at the Intermediate People’s Court in the Xinjiang capital Urumqi, 16 June 2014, for the trial of those accused in the attack in October 2013 in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square that killed two tourists
Xinhua named some of the other men who were executed along with the Tiananmen attack perpetrators:
