BEIJING — Soldiers on foot and in armored carriers swarmed Tibet’s capital Saturday, enforcing a strict curfew a day after protesters burned shops and cars to vent their anger against Chinese rule.
In another western city, police clashed with hundreds of Buddhist monks leading a sympathy demonstration.
The violence erupted just two weeks before China’s Summer Olympics celebrations kick off with the start of the torch relay, which passes through Tibet. China is gambling that its crackdown will not draw an international outcry over human- rights violations that could lead to boycotts of the Olympics.
The latest unrest began Monday on the anniversary of a 1959 uprising against Chinese rule. Tibet was effectively independent for decades before communist troops entered in 1950.
Initially, the protests were led by Buddhist monks demanding the release of other detained monks. Their demands spiraled to include cries for Tibet’s independence and turned violent Friday when police tried to stop a group of protesting monks. Pent-up grievances against Chinese rule came to the fore, as Tibetans directed their anger against Chinese and their shops, hotels and other businesses.
It was the fiercest challenge to Beijing’s authority in nearly two decades.
China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported at least 10 civilians were burned to death Friday. The Dalai Lama’s exiled Tibetan government in India said Chinese authorities killed at least 30 Tibetans and possibly as many as 100. The figures could not be verified.
In the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, on Saturday, police manned checkpoints and armored personnel carriers rattled on mostly empty streets as people stayed indoors under a curfew, witnesses said. The show of force imposed a tense quiet.
Foreign tourists in Lhasa were told to leave, a hotel manager and travel guide said, with the guide adding that some were turned back at the airport.
Even as Chinese forces appeared to reassert control in Lhasa, a second day of sympathy protests erupted in a Tibetan town 750 miles away. Police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of Buddhist monks and other Tibetans after they marched from the Labrang monastery and smashed windows in the county police headquarters in Xiahe, witnesses said.
Also Saturday, fresh demonstrations by Tibetan exiles and their supporters sprouted up in neighboring Nepal, New York, Switzerland and Australia.
International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said Saturday that he opposed an Olympics boycott over Tibet.
“We believe that the boycott doesn’t solve anything,” Rogge told reporters. “On the contrary, it is penalizing innocent athletes, and it is stopping the organization from something that definitely is worthwhile organizing.”
