Tibetan expatriates demonstrate against the Chinese crackdown on protesters in Tibet in front of the Palace of Justice, Brussels, last Sunday. Some 500 protesters sang the Tibetan anthem, waved Tibetan flags and held banners saying, 'Stop Killing in Tibet' and 'No Olympics in China'. - AP

BEIJING (AP):

Violence spilled over from Tibet into neighbouring provinces yesterday as Tibetan protesters defied a Chinese government crackdown while the Dalai Lama warned that the area faced "cultural genocide" and appealed to the world for help.

Supporters of the Dalai Lama said 80 people were killed during the protests in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, with at least 72 others injured. It was the latest negative publicity for China ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August.

Protests were reported in Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces. All have Tibetan populations.

The demonstrations came after five days of protests in Lhasa escalated into violence Friday, with Buddhist monks and others torching police cars and shops in the fiercest challenge to Beijing's rule over the region in nearly two decades.

"Whether intentionally or unintentionally, some kind of cultural genocide is taking place," the Dalai Lama said, referring to China's policy of encouraging members of the ethnic Han majority to migrate to the region, as well as restrictions on Buddhist temples and re-education programmes for monks.

Investigation

The Dalai Lama - Tibetans' spiritual leader - told reporters in Dharmsala, the north Indian town where Tibet's self-declared government-in-exile is based, that an international body should investigate the government's crackdown on the Lhasa protests.

In a later interview with the British Broadcasting Corp, the Dalai Lama said he fears the situation could worsen.

"It's possible, it's very possible. It's really desperate," he said. "Things become tense as the Tibetan side is determined, the Chinese side also equally determined. So that means the result is killing, most often."

Thubten Samphel, a spokesman for the Dalai Lama's government, said multiple witnesses inside Tibet had counted at least 80 corpses since the violence broke out Friday. He did not know how many of the bodies were those of protesters.