China steps up efforts to show it is in control

Police also had published a list of 53 people wanted in connection with the riots, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

The uprising was the broadest and most sustained against Chinese rule in almost two decades, embarrassing and frustrating the communist leadership, which hoped for a smooth run-up to the Beijing Olympics in August. Thousands of troops and police have been deployed to contain the unrest.

The government says at least 22 people have died in Lhasa; Tibetan rights groups say nearly 140 Tibetans were killed, including 19 in Gansu province.

So far, the United States, Britain and Germany have all condemned China for its response to the protests, but stopped short of threatening to boycott the games or the Aug. 8 opening ceremony.

But French President Nicolas Sarkozy has suggested he could boycott the opening ceremony.

Sarkozy, who had faced criticism in France for his relative silence on the issue, couched his comments late Tuesday cautiously: He made it clear that skipping the ceremony was one of several possible French responses to the violence in Tibet.

“Our Chinese friends must understand the worldwide concern that there is about the question of Tibet, and I will adapt my response to the evolutions in the situation that will come, I hope, as rapidly as possible,” he told reporters in southwest France.

Asked whether he supported a boycott, Sarkozy said he could “not close the door to any possibility.”

His aides confirmed that Sarkozy was talking only about the opening ceremony. His ministers have repeatedly said that France does not support a boycott of the entire games.

U.S. President George W. Bush has long planned to attend the Beijing Olympics, and the White House has said the crackdown in Tibet is not cause for him to cancel.

China has banned foreign journalists from traveling to the protest areas, making it extremely difficult to verify any information. But the Ministry of Foreign Affairs plans to take a small group of foreign reporters to Lhasa on Wednesday, though it is unclear how much freedom they will be given.

The government said hundreds of people have surrendered to police in recent days.

Xinhua said more than 280 turned themselves in for involvement in the Lhasa riots – a figure confirmed by the Tibet Public Security Bureau.

Another 381 surrendered in Aba county in Sichuan, the official China Daily reported. It quoted Shu Tao, a Communist Party boss of Luoerda village in the county, as saying most were “ordinary people and monks who were deceived or coerced.”