Istanbul  - Several hundred Uighur demonstrators protested in Istanbul Monday against Chinese "brutality" after at least 140 people were officially stated to have been killed and more than 800 injured in clashes between Uighurs and police in western China.

Chanting "we are not terrorists" and "we are Turks, we are Moslems, we are Uighurs", the protesters waved banners of the Uighur independence movement in the downtown protest.

Chinese police were reported earlier to have arrested several hundred rioters following the violence, which began after a protest by Uighurs on Sunday in the regional capital of Urumqi, the official Xinhua news agency quoted a Xinjiang police spokesman as saying.

The US-based World Uighur Congress quoted witnesses as saying scores of Uighurs were shot or beaten to death by police.(dpa)