Chinese man takes up arms against IS
Print Edition
A YOUNG Chinese man has become the country’s first citizen known to have traveled to Syria to fight with the Kurds against Islamic State, according to a newspaper report yesterday.
Pan Yang, from a farming family in southwest China’s Sichuan Province, went to Syria via Thailand, Turkey and Lebanon some time around September and ended up fighting with a Kurdish militia, the Sichuan-based Huaxi Metropolitan Daily said on its website.
Pan’s elderly parents have no idea where Syria is, nor what Islamic State is, his sister, Pan Xiaolan, told the newspaper.
“Come home quickly,” the paper quoted her as saying.
Pan Yang told the BBC’s Chinese language site last week that he was fighting with a Kurdish militia called the People’s Protection Units, or YPG.
However, on his Weibo account on Wednesday, Pan said he regretted talking to the BBC, saying that it could cause Islamic State to target Chinese people in the Middle East.
“I think I’ve done a really stupid thing,” he wrote. “If I live or die matters not,” Pan said.
“There are lots of compatriots in Iraq and the Middle East. I don’t want revenge carried out against them because of me. I’m sorry. My head really hurts. I don’t want to see innocent people hurt because of me.”
Pan’s Weibo account features pictures of him holding weapons, including rocket launchers.
The newspaper did not specify Pan’s ethnicity or religion but judging from his name and the fact he is from Sichuan, he would appear to be a member of the majority Han community.
The Chinese government says some Uygurs, a mainly Muslim people from China’s far western region of Xinjiang, have traveled to Syria and Iraq to fight with militant groups there.
Last month, Islamic State said it had killed a Chinese hostage, prompting outrage in Beijing.
The BBC said Pan was inspired by the story of a British Chinese person who had joined a Kurdish group fighting Islamic State.
“People should do interesting things ... For me, what I can do is pick up a gun and go to war,” he told the broadcaster.
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