Anti-China protests erupt in Tibet

The chaotic scene was the latest, and most violent, confrontation in a series of protests that began Monday and now represent a major challenge to the ruling Communist Party as it prepares to play host to the Olympics in August.

Beijing is facing the most serious and prolonged demonstrations in the remote Himalayan region since the late 1980s, when it suppressed a rebellion there with lethal force that left scores and possibly hundreds of ethnic Tibetans dead.

The Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibet, and his supporters around the world have embraced the protesters in Lhasa, and thousands of Buddhists in neighboring India and Nepal took to the streets Friday in sympathy.

Beijing is clearly alarmed that the wave of negative publicity could disrupt its elaborate plans for the Olympics and its hopes that the Games will showcase its rising influence and prosperity rather than domestic turmoil. Residents in Lhasa, reached by telephone, said the authorities had placed much of the city under a curfew by Friday night while military police were blocking many city streets. One resident reported seeing tanks in the center of the city.

Xinhua, China's official news agency, issued a short statement in English confirming that shops in Lhasa had been set on fire and that other stores had closed because of the violence. But the protests otherwise received no coverage in the Chinese press.

The Dalai Lama released a statement on Friday calling on both sides to avoid violence and appealing to the Chinese leadership to "address the long simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people."

The situation in Lhasa represents a complicated predicament for the Communist Party, which is now holding its annual meeting of the National People's Congress in Beijing. Party leaders are grappling with growing criticism of China's domestic rights record and its ties to Sudan, which the United States has accused of waging a genocidal campaign in its Darfur region.

Just as Beijing sees the Olympics as a chance to strut confidently on the world stage, so its opponents see the international publicity ahead of the Games as a chance to press deep grievances against the one-party state.

In the past, China has not hesitated to crush major protests in Tibet or jail disobedient monks. President Hu Jintao, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party, served as party boss in Tibet during a violent crackdown against protests in 1989. His support for the bloody suppression of unrest that year earned him the good will of Deng Xiaoping, then the paramount leader, and led directly to his elevation to the Politburo Standing Committee and eventually to China's top leadership posts.

But Chinese leaders may be more reluctant to order such heavy-handed tactics as Beijing prepares to host the Olympics. On Friday, different accounts emerged about how Chinese military police in Lhasa handled the demonstrations.

Radio Free Asia, a nonprofit news agency financed by the U.S. government, quoted Tibetan witnesses who described Chinese police officers firing into crowds of protesters and killing at least two people in the city's ancient Barkhor area. Other accounts from Tibetans suggested that the police had also attacked Buddhist monks.

But a Chinese resident, reached by telephone, said stories were spreading among Chinese residents that soldiers had been injured and had not been allowed to fight back against Tibetans throwing rocks. Another Chinese man living near the Barkhor area said family members told him that two soldiers died and that Tibetans were beating Chinese residents with iron rods.

The sharp escalation in violence Friday, and the sense of dread described by several residents, came a day after the Chinese Foreign Ministry said that the situation in Lhasa had stabilized. The protest started Monday when Buddhist monks began peaceful demonstrations against religious restrictions by the Chinese authorities. The police arrested 50 or 60 monks, but other protests followed on Tuesday and Wednesday as monks in two different monasteries took to the streets.

The apparent epicenter of protests Friday was the Tromsikhang Market, a massive, concrete structure built in the Barkhor area of Lhasa by the Chinese authorities in the early 1990s.

What actually sparked the violence is unclear, as accounts differed between Chinese and Tibetan residents. Monks from the Ramoche Temple, located a short walk from the market, reportedly began to march in the Barkhor area.

The Ramoche monks intended to protest the rough treatment of monks who had marched earlier in the week, according to a Tibetan activist in the United States who has communicated with people in Lhasa.

When police officers began beating the monks, ordinary Tibetans rioted in the Barkhor area, the activist said. Angry mobs set fire to a police car and a store owned by a Chinese shopkeeper, the activist said.

But a Chinese travel agent in Lhasa, reached by telephone, said Tibetans had instigated the violence and set fire to an empty tour bus parked outside the Ramoche Temple. Another Chinese resident described 50 or 60 young Tibetans burning stores owned by Chinese merchants as well as two fire trucks and two police cars.

"I saw someone who was dead and covered in a sheet," the Chinese resident said in a telephone interview. "The Tromsikhang market was destroyed, except for the shops owned by Tibetans. I heard a soldier shouting, 'Please go home and stop fighting!' "

News agencies also reported clashes between monks from Ramoche Temple and military police. "The monks are still protesting," a witness told The Associated Press. "Police and army cars were burned. There are people crying. Hundreds of people, including monks and civilians are in the protests."

Radio Free Asia reported that Tibetan protesters were waving traditional white scarves and shouting, "Free Tibet." The agency said the riots began about 10 a.m. and had largely quieted down by 3:30 p.m. after paramilitary police were mobilized.

Meanwhile, anxious tourists stranded in Lhasa posted worried comments on online forums for travelers. "The situation seems to be very nervous and paranoid up here," wrote one person in broken English in a chat room sponsored by the Lonely Planet tour guide. "There is police and military everwhere. Suddenly you would see some policeman running and rushig (sic) somewhere."

The ethnic friction evident in the violence Friday has long simmered just below the surface in Lhasa. For more than two decades, a steady influx of Chinese migrants has transformed and stratified the city.

The protests in Lhasa coincided with the anniversary of a failed 1959 Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule that forced the Dalai Lama to flee to India.

Huang Yuanxi, Zhang Jing and Jake Hooker contributed research from Beijing, and Steven Lee Myers and Graham Bowley contributed reporting from New York. Somini Sengupta contributed reporting from India.