China sealed off an an ethnic Tibetan area after anti-Chinese protesters killed a policeman on Monday and paramilitary forces responded with gunfire.

Police and paramilitary units patrolled the streets of Luhuo in southwestern Sichuan province and put up checkpoints on all roads in the mountainous district to prevent anyone from leaving or entering, and effectively closing off five other districts to the north.

Several dozen protesters, uncowed by a huge police operation to quash the pro-independence unrest rippling through Tibetan communities, marched into a small northwestern town yesterday before staging a sit-in.

Tibetans in Heka, in the Qinghai province that lies to the north of Tibet and is the birthplace of the Dalai Lama, walked through the town shouting: “Long live the Dalai Lama.”

The unrest highlights the difficulty Beijing faces in calming down a people who yearn for the return of the Dalai Lama and chafe at some of the restrictions of Chinese rule.

Meng Jianzhu, China’s Minister of Public Security, toured Lhasa on Monday, becoming the first high-level central government official to visit since several days of demonstrations by monks turned into a riot on March 15. At least 19 people, mainly ethnic Han Chinese, were killed and hundreds of shops and offices burnt by furious Tibetan mobs armed with rocks and knives.

Meng ordered Tibet’s security forces to remain on alert and issued the latest stinging attack on the Dalai Lama: “The Dalai clique refuses to give up their evil designs, and even in their death throes are planning new acts of sabotage,” he said.

The minister toured damaged shopping streets and congratulated police on a job well done. At the Jokhang temple, and the Sera and Drepung monasteries, where the initial protests were launched, he chided monks: “Every religion should carry out their activities according to the law and should never undermine national solidarity. Participating in the riot essentially violated the doctrines of Tibetan Buddhism.”

The latest outburst of anti-Chinese feeling among Tibetans began on March 10 with a march by several hundred monks in Lhasa and a demonstration by about a dozen in front of the Jokhang Temple in the heart of the Tibetan capital. China has announced the arrests of 13 people in Lhasa in connection with the incident outside the temple on charges of illegal assembly.

A total of 29 people have been arrested. Another 53 have been placed on a wanted list, of whom four have turned themselves in and three have been caught.

The Tibet Daily said: “On the square of the Jokhang temple, a number of monks appeared, yelling reactionary slogans and holding up a self-made ‘snow-mountain lion’ banner to gather a crowd and stir up trouble.” The “snow lion” flag has become a symbol of demands for Tibetan independence from China.

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