Karakax

The Xinjiang government said in a short statement on its main news website that the incident occurred just before 5pm in Karakax county, deep in southern Xinjiang’s Uighur heartland.

After 80km and 1½ hours there is finally some green at the turn-off to Píshān, but the desert soon reclaims the road's boundaries, threatening the road itself, until Karakax (Mòyù), about 25km before Khotan, where there are tidy cultivated fields of corn, cotton and rice.

The road then descends into the valley of the Karakax River, where a detour cuts through to Khotan at the southern extremity of the Taklamakhan Desert on the Silk Route.