CHINA:AS PROTESTS against Chinese rule spread to Tibetan communities within Chinese provinces bordering Tibet, the government in Beijing tried to contain the most powerful threat to its international reputation since the Tiananmen Square massacre of pro-democracy activists in 1989.
With the Beijing Olympic Games just five months away, the government is defending its crackdown on Buddhist monks and Tibetan citizens in Lhasa and other Tibetan centres, by accusing the Dalai Lama of organised insurgency and insisting its security forces acted with restraint in the face of attack by angry mobs.
The Dalai Lama said the crackdown was "cultural genocide" and said up to 100 people had been killed. Significantly, he still said he supported Beijing staging the Olympics. The International Olympic Committee has also shrugged off calls for a boycott of the games. The international community is keenly watching to see what happens next, particularly as the unrest filters into areas bordering Tibet.
In Lhasa, the streets were said to be largely deserted yesterday as residents took stock of a tumultuous week, which began with peaceful protests by Tibetan Buddhist monks and ended with angry rioters facing off against armed police.
At the Labrang monastery, monks said they had seen four people shot dead after riot police fired tear gas on the crowd and attacked the protesters.
Checking these facts is impossible because, following a brief window when this correspondent and others managed to get into the town at the weekend, authorities have sealed off the town.
Due to fears of retaliation, no one was prepared to give their names, but one long-haired young Tibetan bore witness to the chaos.
"This morning I was on the spot," he said. "There was two hours of chaos. The police arrested several local Tibetans wearing traditional outfits. They were not lamas. It happened because the police have been pushing too much, too severe and people reacted," he added. "They tried to catch people and punish people after the riots this morning. Everything is calm now. There are lots of police coming tonight."
The Xiahe riots kicked off as a show of support for the Lhasa demonstrations. On Friday, hundreds of Labrang monks marched through Xiahe holding aloft Tibetan flags, which are banned in China.
The road to Xiahe, which is perched nearly 3,000m in lofty peaks at the edge of the Tibetan peninsula, is dotted with Coca-Cola signs in Chinese and Tibetan and stencilled advertising paintings on walls for Chinese telecoms companies, signs of the country's growing affluence. This weekend, the road from Lanzhou was packed with scores of police cars and heavy trucks full of soldiers.
Fire engines also sped into town - in previous situations in Xiahe the authorities have turned water cannon on the protesters.
The town of Xiahe is divided roughly into two halves: on one side the Tibetans who make up 50 per cent of the population; and on the other side, Chinese of the Han ethnic group that dominates China (40 per cent) and Hui Muslims (10 per cent).
Early on Saturday, about 1,000 Tibetan monks and lay people performed three circuits around a white stupa, burning incense and offering prayers for the long life of the Dalai Lama and for his safe return to Tibet.
The town centre was sealed off by police, but witnesses said a crowd of 20,000 gathered in the town, again moving on public buildings. They raised a Tibetan national flag at a school and the air soon filled with tear gas and smoke from burning vehicles. Police lost control of the centre.
Labrang is an important site to the branch of Tibetan Buddhism known as the Yellow Hat sect and considered the most significant Tibetan site outside of Lhasa.
It is home to the Living Buddha, who comes third in the Tibetan Buddhist religious hierarchy after the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama. There are six million Tibetans in China, 2.7 million of them in the Tibetan Autonomous Region, while 111,000 live in exile.
Beijing sees itself as a liberating force that freed Tibetans from the backward yoke of a theocracy, bringing prosperity and doing much to open up the famously secretive region to modern ways.
For some, this is a purely Tibetan matter. A woman wearing a brown leather jacket was angry at what she saw as foreign intrusion.
"Why do you care what's happening? This is an issue for us Tibetans, not for you," she said.
The clashes at Labrang show just how widespread the demonstrations have become and give an indication of how big a challenge it will be for the Beijing government to limit the wider problem the violence has caused.
Beijing lays the blame squarely at the feet of the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising nine years after the People's Liberation Army entered Lhasa. The Chinese government considers him a dangerous separatist.
Describing the Lhasa demonstrators as "vandals", the official Chinese news agency Xinhua ran stories of heroism by police and armed militia in the face of "sabotage . . . organised, premeditated and masterminded by the Dalai clique".
The agency said rioters set fire to 22 buildings, torched dozens of police cars and private vehicles and looted banks, schools and shops in "plotted unrest". At least 10 civilians died, Xinhua said.
Xiahe is in the mostly Tibetan area of Amdo, part of which is in the Chinese province of Gansu.
The Tibetan Autonomous Region only refers to part of Tibet, but nearly three million Tibetans live in neighbouring provinces of China, such as Gansu and Sichuan.
For Tibetans, the borders imposed by Beijing are irrelevant and there have been protests all over this region. According to the Free Tibet Campaign, the riots have also spread to Kirti monastery in Aba County, in the province of Sichuan, where eyewitnesses say they saw 13 people shot by security forces. Other reports say up to 30 were shot.
Distressing as the body count is, figures from witnesses should be treated with caution - they are difficult to verify and often sent in the heat of the moment, via text message, by people under extreme pressure in the thick of the fighting. However, a lack of transparency from the Chinese side means the figures can never be dismissed out of hand.
In Machu town in Gansu, 300 to 400 Tibetans marched in the streets before attacking a police station and then setting a Chinese restaurant on fire. The manner in which Tibetan frustrations have focused on Han Chinese living in these areas is a major source of concern as it could seriously undermine the Tibetans' cause.