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BEIJING : The Tibetan capital Lhasa erupted in violence Friday as security forces used gunfire to quell Buddhist monk-led protests that saw markets and cars set alight, witnesses and rights groups said.
The violence, which left at least a dozen people hospitalised with injuries, came amid an ever-growing campaign by Tibetans to challenge China's rule of the Himalayan region in the lead-up to the Beijing Olympics in August.
Foreign tourists and a local Tibetan reported hearing gunfire in Lhasa as riot police and soldiers were sent in to quell the uprising.
"Sources confirm gunshots being fired to disperse the protesting crowd," said the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said, run by Tibetan exiles in India.
A police car was burnt and one of the biggest markets in Lhasa was set ablaze, witnesses and rights groups reported.
The unrest also spread to areas of China outside of Tibet, with Buddhist monks leading a rally of up to 300 people in Xiahe, Gansu province, the site of one of Tibet's most important monasteries, an AFP reporter witnessed.
"Shops were set on fire in violence in downtown Lhasa on Friday afternoon," the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
"Witnesses said a number of shops were burnt and some others nearby shut down business."
Xinhua said some people had been sent to hospital with unspecified injuries.
A nurse at one hospital told AFP that about a dozen people had been brought in with injuries, but she gave no more details.
The fires broke out in a market and street near the Jokhang temple in the old part of Lhasa, a local fireman and tourists in the city told AFP.
The temple is regarded as one of the most sacred sites for Tibetan Buddhists.
The unrest followed three days of protests by monks in Lhasa, India and elsewhere around the world that marked the anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.
China has ruled Tibet since 1951, a year after sending troops in to "liberate" the region from what it said was feudal rule.
Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, fled Tibet following the failed 1959 uprising.
Tibetan rights groups have vowed to pile intense pressure on China over its controversial rule of the region in the lead-up to the Summer Olympic Games, when the world's spotlight will be put on the nation's communist rulers.
The Dalai Lama spoke out on Monday about what he termed "unimaginable and gross human rights violations" in Tibet by the Chinese authorities.
"It shows the level of frustration that was building up," International Campaign for Tibet spokeswoman Kate Saunders told AFP, referring to the emotions of the Tibetans.
"They seem to have reached breaking point against the policies that the Chinese have used in Tibet."
The protests are the biggest since 1989, when current Chinese President Hu Jintao was the Communist Party chief of Tibet.
Hu is due to be re-elected by the nation's rubber-stamp parliament as president for another five years.
The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said the protests began when 100 monks from the Ramoche temple north of Lhasa walked into the city centre early Friday.
The monks "were blocked by Chinese armed police which led to minor scuffles between the two," the centre said in a statement posted on its website.
"The monks carried forward their peaceful demonstration which eventually grew bigger with bystanders joining them."
The International Campaign for Tibet's Saunders said a police car was burnt near the Ramoche temple.
Saunders said the rights group had also received reports of a fire at the Tromsikhang market in Barkor Street, which has a line of stalls that run around the Jokhang temple.
Troops had earlier surrounded the three biggest monasteries in and around Lhasa, Saunders' organisation said.
Foreigners in Lhasa contacted by AFP reported that Buddhist monks and others had protested throughout the city, and that tourists had been told to stay in their hotel rooms.
"Buddhist monks have marched in the street," a French tourist contacted at his hotel told AFP.
"It is not possible to go to Barkor street, the monastery is closed... it is forbidden to go down there."
A German tourist reported a heavy police and military presence in Lhasa.
"We know there is a lot of military and police in the middle of Lhasa. When they told us to stay in the hotel, we could do nothing else."
Hundreds of monks took part in protests earlier in the week in Lhasa, rights groups said. - AFP/ms
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