“The Turkish diplomats in Southeast Asia have given Turkish ID cards to Uyghur citizens of Xinjiang province and then they have sent them to Turkey to prepare for war against the Syrian government alongside ISIS,” the Arabic-language Iraq al-Qanoon news website quoted Tong Bichan, head of the Criminal Department of China’s Public Security Ministry as telling reporters on Monday.

Uyghur Muslims are a Chinese minority group who speak Turkish language.

Earlier this month, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted that Ankara has directly supported terrorists in Syria.

“If it were not due to the support of Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar for the militants in Syria, they could not have achieved anything,” Erdogan said, Turkish-language daily Hurriyat reported.

He noted that Ankara, Riyadh and Doha have supplied military and logistical backup for the terrorists.

Erdogan’s remarks came as his Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu denied any cooperation between Turkey and Saudi Arabia in supporting the foreign-backed terrorists.

In late June, the London-based al-Hayat newspaper reported that 12,000 Turkish forces are ready for military intervention in Syria under the pretext of creating a buffer zone to protect the Turkish borders against the threat of the terrorist groups.