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CHENGDU, China: Enraged Tibetan youths embarked on a rampage of destruction against Chinese businesses in Lhasa that left parts of the once-fabled city in ruins, according to one tourist who saw the protests.
Juan Carlos Alonso, 46, a Spaniard staying on Beijing Street in the old quarter near some of Lhasa's holiest shrines, recounted how he saw Tibetan anger toward the Chinese boil over into violence.
"The purpose was to destroy everything on that main street, beginning with all the Chinese stores and restaurants," Alonso told AFP after arriving in Chengdu airport late Sunday before catching a flight home.
"The restaurant owners and those Chinese on the street had to hide," said the former employee of a German engineering firm who had a first-hand view of the onslaught in the streets of Lhasa on Friday.
"They (the Chinese) lowered the shutters, but the Tibetans kicked their way in, dragging people out, beating them with stones. There were knifes, stones, machetes, butcher knifes -- they were using everything that came to hand."
"Many Chinese were running for their lives," Alonso said, estimating that he had seen at least 35 ethnic Chinese covered in blood, but had not seen any dead.
Describing the masses of rioters as mainly Tibetan men in their late teens with only a few monks in the crowd, he said that in front of the Banakshol hotel where he was staying, all the stores and restaurants had been ransacked.
"There are none left, they've all been burnt," he said.
Alonso, who arrived in the city on Wednesday, said the tension between Tibetan and Chinese police had been palpable before youths exploded with rage.
The unrest in Lhasa began on March 10, the 49th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising that led the Dalai Lama to flee into exile in India. China's atheist communist rulers have controlled the devoutly Buddhist region since 1951.
"I was not afraid," continued Alonso. "I knew they weren't going after me. It would be one thing if they said 'get the Spaniard,' but the Tibetans were going after the Chinese."
"One girl, they grabbed her on the street and took her towards a door before kicking and stoning her. The girl was crying out for help."
As vehicles, storefronts and restaurants burned late Friday, the Chinese military rolled in with tanks and armoured vehicles. Alonso said he and a Dutch couple he had befriended knew it was time to escape.
"There was a time (Friday night) when shots were fired. Then on Saturday morning there were shots -- several bursts of them."
"With every passing moment, there were more and more soldiers. We said, 'we're leaving'."
As Alonso and his friends cut through back streets swarming with heavily armed Chinese troops, the Spaniard said parts of the ancient city were already in ruin.
Buildings and cars burned, while all manner of goods -- rice, flour, meat, dresses, textiles, desks, chairs -- littered the streets.
"At one point, one super aggressive Chinese military guy came up to us yelling," Alonso said.
"The guy grabbed his gun, shot bang, bang, bang into the air. I thought to myself, 'He better not drop his machine gun.'"
With foreign journalists being denied entry into Lhasa, it is impossible to determine how many people were killed in the violence.
Thirteen people were killed, the chairman of Tibet's government, Qiangba Puncog, told reporters in Beijing. Exiled Tibetan groups say about 80 Tibetans were killed, and possibly many more.
"Both sides are victims here. That's the way it is when politics are involved," Alonso said. - AFP/ac
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