The Times (of London) has an exclusive report up: ” Chinese paramilitary police killed eight people and wounded dozens more when they fired on a protest by several hundred Tibetan monks and villagers, The Times has been told.”

The protesters were enraged by a government inspection team trying to confiscate pictures of the Dalai Lama.

The clash, one of the bloodiest since Tibetan protests against China erupted last month, occurred in the village of Donggu, high in the mountains of Sichuan province near the border with Tibet, after government officials entered the sprawling ancient hillside monastery of Tongkor.

They searched the room of every monk, confiscating all mobile phones as well as the pictures. The monastery’s website (www.donggusi.com) says that it is home to 350 monks. A contact telephone for the monastery was not operational yesterday.

When the officials had removed the photographs, a 74-year-old monk, identified as Cicheng Danzeng, tried to stop police from throwing the images on the ground — an act seen as a desecration by Tibetans, who revere the Dalai Lama as their god king. A young man working in the monastery, Cicheng Pingcuo, 25, also made a stand and both were arrested.

The team of officials then demanded that all the monks denounce the Dalai Lama, who fled China after a failed uprising in 1959. One monk, Yixi Lima, stood up and voiced his opposition, prompting the other monks to add their voices.

About 6.30pm, the entire monastic body marched down to a nearby river, where paramilitary police were encamped and demanded the release of the two men. They were joined by several hundred local villagers, many of them enraged at the detention of the elderly monk, who locals say is well respected in the area for his learning and piety.

Shouting “Long Live the Dalai Lama”, “Let the Dalai Lama come back” and “We want freedom”, the crowd demonstrated until about 9pm.

Witnesses said that up to 1,000 paramilitary police used force to try to end the protest and opened fire on the crowd. In the gunfire, eight people died, according to a local resident in direct contact with the monastery. These included a 27-year-old monk identified as Cangdan and two women named as Zhulongcuo and Danluo.

Such a wonderful country to host the Olympic Games this year, China. Isn’t it? They’re staying true to the spirit of the Games. Harmony. Peace. Equality. Celebrating life.

And how does the International Olympic Committee deal with it? Simple, they have written guidelines for the media (Michelle Malkin):

So it is with a certain grim satisfaction that I pass along the secret International Olympic Committee’s media guidelines, dug up by the Wall Street Journal. Basically, they want to make sure you know that these notions you have about “freedom of the press” and “freedom of expression” need to be bottled up, because Beijing wants everything to run smoothly:

Addressing its world-wide members in an internal memo, viewed by The Wall Street Journal, the IOC reiterates its opposition to taking any public stance on controversial Chinese policies, describing them as “sovereign matters outside of our mandate.”

Sure, I can understand the IOC wanting to keep the muzzle on its own members. But how about this part?

The eight-page “briefing kit,” whose existence was made public by the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders, also calls on national Olympic committees to send athletes who are “in compliance with the Olympic Charter” to the Games.

“Athletes will have total freedom of expression” to answer questions from the media, the memo states.

“However, rules for athletes clearly state that the venues of the Games are not a place for proactive political or religious expression,” the memo says, adding: “In Beijing, sanctions and penalties will be applied in any cases considered to be a breach of IOC policy.”

Did I read that right? Governments are being pressured to pick politically acceptable athletes? And what do they mean by “sanctions and penalties?”

What countries need to do is to send the best athletes and hope that they’re politically active. My respect for athletes will increase tremendously if they use the Games to point out that China’s government is barbaric.