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BEIJING: China said Wednesday at least 660 people had surrendered over deadly protests in and near Tibet as French President Nicolas Sarkozy raised the prospect of boycotting the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony.
More than 280 people had given themselves up to authorities following deadly protests in the Tibetan capital Lhasa against Chinese rule, the state-run Xinhua news agency said.
Meanwhile in Ngawa, a region in Sichuan province in southwest China next to Tibet, 381 people involved in recent clashes had also handed themselves over to police, the state-run China Daily newspaper reported.
"Most of those who have come forward are ordinary people and monks who were deceived or coerced," said Shu Tao, a local Communist Party chief, according to the China Daily.
Lhasa prosecutors had also issued arrest warrants for 29 people allegedly involved in a protest that broke out in the Tibetan capital on March 14, while a "most-wanted" list of 53 people had been issued by police, Xinhua said.
Tibetan officials in exile have said 140 people had been killed in the unrest over the past two weeks in Tibet and neighbouring areas with large Tibetan populations, while China reported there had been 20 deaths.
The protests against Beijing's rule of Tibet began in Lhasa on March 10 to mark the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule in the region.
But they quickly turned bloody and spilled over into other parts of the country, with the Chinese authorities accused of heavy-handedness in its repression of the demonstrations.
Independent verification of the figures was made extremely difficult by a Chinese decision to bar foreign reporters from travelling to areas affected by the unrest.
However, a first group of about a dozen selected foreign journalists was scheduled to begin a guided three-day tour to Lhasa Wednesday.
The unrest comes at a delicate time for the Chinese authorities with the Beijing Olympic Games less than five months away and the eyes of the world on the booming Asian giant.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy left open Tuesday the possibility of boycotting the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony over China's crackdown.
Sarkozy, who arrives in Britain for a two-day visit on Wednesday, said "all options are open" regarding a boycott. He appealed to the "sense of responsibility" of China's leaders over the unrest.
The president's aides specified that France was still considering the possibility of snubbing the opening ceremony, but ruled out boycotting the entire Games.
Other countries remained firmly against any boycott, with the White House saying US President George W. Bush still planned to be present for the August 8 opening of the Olympics.
Against the backdrop of tight control of the foreign media's movement in and near Tibet, Chinese citizens voiced anger at what they considered unfair reporting by overseas media.
Chinese students abroad set up a website, www.anti-cnn.com, to collect evidence of "one-sided and untrue" foreign reporting, blasting "the Western Goebbels' Nazi media," according to the China Daily, in reference to German dictator Hitler's propaganda minister.
"In their reporting about the March unrest in Tibet, the western media have once again showed their ugly and evil true face to the people of the world," the website said.
Chinese authorities have repeatedly accused the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader who fled his homeland after the 1959 uprising, of masterminding the latest unrest.
But the Dalai Lama, who has said he is open to dialogue with Beijing, denies this categorically and reiterated a pledge Tuesday to resign as spokesman for the Tibetan people if there were more violent anti-Chinese protests.
Communist forces were sent into Tibet in 1950 to "liberate" the region, but resentment and tension has simmered virtually ever since. - AFP/ac
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