BEIJING (AP) — When a remote county in China’s far west exploded last week in what appeared to be the country’s worst ethnic violence since 2009, it took the government six days to put out an exact death toll. It isn’t clear when a full picture of what happened might emerge, if ever, given Beijing’s iron-fisted grip on the minority region.

The Chinese government uses expansive controls and propaganda to maintain a virtual monopoly on the narrative in the tense region of Xinjiang, where minority Uighurs complain of oppression under Beijing’s rule.