Fourteen more people, including two from the Han ethnic group, were Thursday given penalties ranging from death to many years in jail, for murder and other crimes in the deadly riots in July in the city of Urumqi.

This is the first time that rioters of the Han ethnic group caught in the Urumqi unrest were held responsible, following the sentencing of six people of the Uygur ethnic group to the death penalty and another to life imprisonment three days ago.

Last Saturday, local courts in South China's Guangdong Province sentenced one Han man to death and another to life in prision over a toy factory brawl that left two Uygur workers dead.

While overseas dissidents criticized the verdicts of fulfilling the government's "political need," people in China applauded the fact that the criminals "got what they deserved" under the law, whether they were Han or Uygur.

Of the two Han people sentenced, Han Junbo was sentenced to death. His accomplice, Liu Bo, was sentenced to 10 years in prison, according to the Urumqi Intermediate People's Court.

Han was found to have beaten an Uygur with a steel bar, and Liu helped beat the Uygur's body with a stick and a bar, causing his death, according to the Xinhua News Agency

The two were among the Han residents who took to the streets two days after mobs of Uygur rioters killed 195 people and injured nearly 2,000 on July 5, in an apparently vindictive move.

Several Uygurs, led by Ahmatjan Moming, were convicted of murder, robbery, arson, and vandalism. They used bricks, stones and sticks to beat two men to death, and robbed the victims of their cell phones, bracelets and other belongings, the court said.

Other mobs drove a bus to break into a Geely Auto sales store to vandalize and burn more than 40 cars, resulting in economic losses of more than 1.6 million yuan ($235,000).

Of the 14 sentenced Thursday, three were given the death sentence. Another three were given the death penalty with a two-year suspension, a sentence usually commuted to life in prison. The rest were given life imprisonment or shorter jail terms.

Hou Hanmin, the spokeswoman of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Regional Government, told the Global Times that more trials and public hearings would continue for the remaining detained suspects, without giving specific dates.

Police have detained nearly 700 suspects related with the riot that erupted on July 5, earlier reports said, in which 197 people died, mostly Han Chinese, and more than 1,600 were wounded, according to official figures.

Xiong Kunxin, a professor of ethnic policy at the Minzu University of China, said there was a fair trial for the violent law-breakers.

"Only harsh penalties could comfort the families of the victims and display the authority of the law," Xiong said.

"The law is meant for justice and will not discriminate against ethnicity, no matter whether they are Han or Uygur," he said.

Dilshat Reshit, a spokesman of the World Uygur Congress (WUC), said the death penalties handed down to Han criminals are only out of the government's political will to demonstrate equality, adding that "all the Uygurs who stood trial so far have been denied a fair hearing."

However, local authorities said that the two trials were fair practices that accord with laws and were carried out under public supervision.

"Nearly 500 people attended the public hearing of Thursday's trials, including defendants' families, plaintiffs' families, members of the provincial People's Congress, citizen representatives and the Chinese media," Wang Wenhua, deputy secretary of the regional committee of political and legislative affairs in Xinjiang, told the Global Times.

He said each defendant was allocated a lawyer to protect the rights of defense and appeal, and the evidence would also be released later.

Public prosecutors presented testimonies of witnesses, autopsy reports and other evidence at the court, and played videos of crime scenes, according to Xinhua.

To some extent, the sentencing of the mobs has offered general relief to most of the people in Xinjiang.

Shi Jinyang, a middle-age local taxi driver, said he believes that the harsh sentences are helpful to maintain order and stability in post-riot Xinjiang.

"Local people have longed for the sentencing for quite a while, and the rulings are justified and convincing," he told the Global Times, suggesting that the government continue to play tough in ensuring stability following the harsh punishment.

Ai Shanjiang, 33, a Uygur van driver in Kashgar, said those rioters deserve capital punishment, "otherwise, those criminals may continue to wreak havoc on society."

Li Zhifeng, an official at the Stability Maintenance Office in Xinjiang, said the number of armed forces has not been reduced, but they have more mobility, he said. The Internet is still blocked, but the local network within the Xinjiang district is unimpeded.