China Arrests Nine Monks for Alleged Bomb Attack in Tibet

China has arrested nine monks for a bomb attack on a government building in Tibet last month, an official said yesterday.

Tibetan support groups warned that it was impossible to verify the claims because the authorities do not allow independent observers into the region.

The state-run Xinhua news agency alleged that the monks from the Tongxia monastery - around 850 miles east of Lhasa - fled after their homemade bomb exploded in Gyanbe township but later confessed to planting it. There was no mention of casualties or damage.

An official with the local Public Security Bureau told the Associated Press that six monks had been detained for allegedly planting the bomb on March 23 and three for shielding the suspects and covering up their crimes.

But Anne Holmes of the Free Tibet campaign questioned why it had taken so long for the news of the incident to emerge, given Beijing's attempts to portray Tibetan protesters as violent.

"The only way anyone can know what's going on is if the Chinese authorities lift the blackout and let independent observers into the region. Otherwise, anything the government says is going to be greeted with suspicion."

Earlier this month Beijing accused the Dalai Lama and his followers of plotting suicide attacks against China and claimed that weapons had been discovered during searches of monasteries.

The Tibetans' exiled spiritual leader denied the claims. He says he believes in peaceful protest and is seeking autonomy, not independence, for Tibet. He has also expressed opposition to a boycott of the Olympic games.

The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, stressed again at the weekend that the problems in Tibet were a purely internal affair, adding:

"Our conflict with the Dalai clique is not an ethnic problem, not a religious problem, nor a human rights problem."