Three Tibetans have been sentenced to lengthy prison terms for starting deadly fires in which six people died during riots in Lhasa, in March last year.

A Chinese court said that it had exercised leniency, stopping short of immediate execution, because the men had turned themselves in and had co-operated with the investigation. Hundreds of people rampaged through the streets of Lhasa on March 14 last year in the worst violence in Tibet in a decade.

One man, Penkyi, was given the death penalty with a two-year reprieve for his role in leading attacks on two clothing stores in which six people were killed. If he does not commit any further offences over the next two years, his death sentence will be commuted.

The first fire killed the store’s ethnic Han Chinese owner, while the second took the lives of five store staff, state media said.

Chinese television has repeatedly shown images of the crumpled bodies of five young female shop assistants crumpled against the bars of an upstairs window, where they had huddled for safety while the rioters set fire to the shop below. One of the girls was an ethnic Tibetan.

Another suspect, also named Penkyi, was sentenced to life in prison by the Lhasa Municipal Intermediate People’s Court. A third man, Chimed, was given 10 years in prison. Many Tibetans use only one name.

When the riot started, Tibetans ran through the city streets, hurling rocks, setting fire to businesses known to be owned by ethnic Han Chinese and attacking ethnic Hans. The violence reflected a widening resentment of Beijing rule as well as anger at a huge influx of ethnic Hans eager to set up businesses in the underdeveloped city or to work for government agencies that offer better terms in remote Tibet than in other regions.

The violence was not limited to Hans; merchants of the Hui Muslim minority were also a target in rioting that Chinese officials say left 22 people dead.

Earlier this month the Lhasa court handed down death sentences to two other Tibetans convicted of starting deadly fires during the riots as well as two suspended death sentences and a term of life imprisonment.

China appears to have delayed the trial until after the emotive first anniversary of the riots to avoid stirring up another bout of anti-Beijing violence.

State media said that the trials had been open to the public and were conducted in accordance with the law. The defendants were provided with Tibetan-language interpreters and their attorneys had expressed their arguments in full. These reports could not be confirmed as the region has been closed to foreign reporters since the riot.

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