China's official news agency accused the Dalai Lama of masterminding the protests against the Chinese regime the Tibetan monks have been holding since the begining of the week. "There has been enough evidence to prove that the recent sabotage in Lhasa was 'organised, premeditated and masterminded' by the Dalai clique," Xinhua said, citing the Tibet government.

From India, where he lives in exile, the Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader, rejected the accusations as 'baseless.' He also asked Chinese authorities to renounce violence and said he was "deeply worried" about the situation inside Tibet.

Both The United States and the European Union has called on China to show 'restraint'  and called for a dialogue with the Dalai Lama.

Gunfire was heard in the streets of Lhasa Friday according to witnesses in the Tibetan capital as violence and fires injured an unknown number of people, according to the official Chinese news agency.

The US Embassy in Beijing said American citizens in Lhasa had heard gunshots. A number of tourists in the Tibetan capital also confirmed the reports, according to the AFP news service.

Several people lost their lives and many others were injured in Lhasa on Friday, an official at the city's medical emergency centre told AFP, with Radio Free Asia reporting at least two people had been killed by Chinese bullets.

According to witnesses, protests degenerated into violence by midday. Shops were burned in the main Barkhor Square in front of the Jokhang Temple in the old part of the city. The temple is regarded as one of the most sacred sites for Tibetan Buddhists.

“There are several fires in the streets leading to Barkhor Square, we are actually in the area,” a fireman in Lhasa told the AFP.

Western tourists witnessed Chinese security forces dispersing protesters. “We were at the Square at around 1 PM (local time). We saw protesters - some of them waving white flags – when the Chinese troops arrived in force and evacuated them,” a French tourist told the AFP.

A Western tourist, interviewed by FRANCE 24, took a photograph of three burning vehicles in front of the Jokhang Temple. At Midday Friday, they were the only pictures from the Lhasa riots to have left Tibet.

"Given the number of tourists in Lhasa, it's very surprising that we're not getting more pictures," said Julien Pain, a FRANCE 24 journalist. "It's even less than what we got during last September's violent protests in Burma, a country known for its harsh censorship." 

The Chinese authorities seemed to have had blocked all information from getting out on Friday. It looks as thought they had brought down all internet connections and cut the phone lines, or at least mobile services. "Firstly, they play on fear, " Lhadon Tethong, the director of the "Students for a Free Tibet" association, told FRANCE 24. "The Tibetan people know that to release a photo, or even make a call abroad, can get them thrown straight into jail."

 

Cyber cafes closed, hotel guests told to stay indoors

He took photographs at the scene, and managed to send one photograph - showing protesters standing behind three overturned and burned cars - to FRANCE 24. He was unable to send more images because a man in civilian clothing entered the cyber café and ordered it to close down.

The tourist said he saw protesters throwing stones at the security forces and passing Chinese civilians, injuring at least one person who appeared to be Chinese. 

Local Tibetans have long accused the Chinese government of luring the majority Han Chinese population into the contested region in a concerted move to dilute Tibetan culture. 

A tourist at a different hotel said guests were rounded up and told to stay in the courtyard. They were not allowed to use telephones or other means of communication.

Another tourist said in an e-mail he had seen Tibetans armed with machetes and sticks, and Chinese riot vehicles equipped with cameras.  The same tourist said smoke could be seen rising from a site in the north of the city.

Demonstrations outside Lhasa

According to Vincent Metten, EU policy director of the Brussels-based NGO, International Campaign for Tibet, there were thousands of Chinese paramilitary troops surrounding the monasteries. "It is difficult to envisage how they will react because they know that the events (in China) are under intense media scrutiny.”

There were demonstrations Friday outside the capital of Lhasa as well, according to news wire reports. Hundreds of monks from the Labrang monastery in the northwestern province of Gansu led a march through the town of Xiahe, said the London-based Free Tibet Campaign, citing sources in the Indian town of Dharamsala, home to Tibet's government-in-exile.

There have been unprecedented protests by Buddhist monks since Monday, which marked the 49^th anniversary of the Dalai Lama’s exile to neighboring India shortly after the Chinese invasion of Tibet. On Thursday, the Beijing administration accused the Dalai Lama of being behind the current demonstrations.