Champa Phuntsok said the death toll from last week's violent demonstrations in the Tibetan capital had risen to 16 and dozens were injured. The Dalai Lama's exiled Tibetan government in India has said that 80 Tibetans were killed — a claim Champa Phuntsok denied.

The uprising, the fiercest against Chinese rule in almost two decades, and its spread to other provinces have posed a challenge for the Communist government as it prepares for the Beijing Summer Olympics, which were supposed to raise China's world standing.

After a weekend in which witnesses said Lhasa echoed with gunfire and armed police shut down the city to reimpose order, Champa Phuntsok steered a line between sounding reassuring and being tough. He told reporters security forces "did not carry or use any lethal weapons," but promised that authorities would deal harshly with rioters who defy a surrender notice issued Saturday.

"No country would allow those offenders or criminals to escape the arm of justice and China is no exception," said Champa Phuntsok, an ethnic Tibetan.

"If these people turn themselves in, they will be treated with leniency within the framework of the law," he said. Otherwise, he added, "we will deal with them harshly."

The Washington, D.C.-based International Campaign for Tibet said residents were fearful of a military sweep after the midnight deadline.

While Lhasa was still swarming with troops, more security forces were mobilizing across western China's mountain valleys and broad plains to deal with sympathy protests in Tibetan communities in the provinces of Gansu, Sichuan and Qinghai.

In Gansu's Maqu county, which borders Sichuan, thousands of monks and ordinary Tibetans clashed with police Monday in various locations, police and a Tibet rights group said.

"We have nothing to protect ourselves and we can't fight back," said an officer at the county police headquarters who refused to give his name or other details. He said about 10 police were injured.

In the city of Lanzhou, about 500 Tibetan students who gathered Sunday on the Northwest Minorities University's soccer field abandoned an overnight vigil. Fifty tried to march into the city, only to be blocked by security forces from leaving the campus, said the London-based Free Tibet Campaign.

A witness in Sichuan said troops moved into Ma'erkang county, adjacent to an area where clashes between monks and police broke out Sunday with unconfirmed reports that as many as seven were killed.

The government also began to tighten its already firm hold on information. Officials expelled foreign reporters from Tibetan areas in Qinghai and Gansu provinces, contravening regulations that opened most of China to foreign media for the Olympics.

Some of the few independent media remaining in Lhasa were also ordered out, making it difficult to verify casualties and other details.

Police in Lhasa kicked out reporters from three Hong Kong television stations — Cable TV, TVB and ATV — and made TVB delete footage of Friday's violence, TVB reported.

Sympathy protests outside China also continued to erupt.

In Nepal, police used bamboo batons to disperse about 100 Tibetan protesters and Buddhist monks near the main U.N. office in Katmandu on Monday. Some 44 people were arrested.

The unrest in Tibet began March 10 on the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule in the region that sent the Dalai Lama and much of the leading Buddhist clergy into exile. Tibet was effectively independent for decades before Communist troops entered in 1950.

But what began as largely peaceful protests by monks spiraled Friday into a melee with Tibetans attacking Chinese and burning their businesses. The outburst came after several years of intensifying government control over Buddhist practices and vilification of the Dalai Lama, whom Tibetans still revere.

In the wake of Friday's violence, Beijing ratcheted up the rhetoric against the Dalai Lama, accusing his supporters of masterminding the riot — a line repeated by Champa Phuntsok.

"This was organized, premeditated, masterminded and incited by the Dalai clique and it was created under the collusion of Tibet independence separatist forces both inside and outside China," Champa Phuntsok said, without giving any details.

Speaking to reporters in India on Sunday, the Dalai Lama decried what he called the "cultural genocide" taking place in his homeland but reiterated his commitment to non-violence. He called for an international investigation into China's crackdown.

Champa Phuntsok described a scene of chaos throughout Lhasa on Friday with "people engaged in reckless beating, smashing, looting and burning." Shops, schools, hospitals and banks were targeted and bystanders were beaten and set on fire, he said.

Among the 16 dead, he said, three people jumped out of building to avoid arrest while 13 were "innocent civilians."

In one case, a person died after being covered in gasoline and then set on fire, he said. In another incident, the protesters "knocked out a police officer on patrol and then they used a knife to cut a piece of flesh from his buttocks the size of a fist," he said.

State television broadcast extensive footage of torched buildings and streets strewn with burned and looted goods, underscoring the government's drive to emphasize the destructive nature of the protests without discussing their underlying causes.

Champa Phuntsok said calm had been restored. Residents said Monday that police were patrolling the streets and had sealed off key roads in the downtown area, where the riots occurred, but that conditions were not as tense as over the weekend.

"Today many people went back to work and some schools are open," said a tour guide. "Prices of food, gasoline and other things are soaring."

Another woman said there was "still a general mood of fear about going out. But it's better than a few days ago." She said a public announcement on a local television station was encouraging people to give themselves up.

Champa Phuntsok said he did not know if anyone had surrendered and police and government officials in Lhasa refused to comment.

In a further sign of China's concern about repairing the situation, Tibet's hard-line Communist Party secretary Zhang Qingli — the region's most powerful official — returned to Lhasa over the weekend and met with security forces, the official Tibet Daily newspaper said. Zhang had been attending the national legislature's annual session in Beijing, which ends Tuesday.

The Tibet Daily quoted Zhang as saying security forces "carried out a frontal assault against the thugs" who rioted in Lhasa.

Enlarge By Mark Ralston, AFP/Getty Images Tibetan pilgrims pray as a police car cruises by at the Rongwu monastery a day after a protest broke out in China's Qinghai Province.