The White House voiced concern over the sentences, which included life terms for two men and 15 to 20 years for five monks. “We don’t think that anyone should break the law, but we also believe in freedom of expression and assembly,” said Dana Perino, a White House spokeswoman.

In a report on Wednesday, a Tibetan advocacy group based in the United States said the government crackdown included sweeps of Tibetan monasteries, the arrests of 160 monks and an extensive “patriotic education” effort to stamp out sympathy for the Dalai Lama and pro-independence sentiment. The group, the International Campaign for Tibet, said that several distraught monks had committed suicide in recent weeks and that the authorities had destroyed or defaced religious imagery and photographs of the Dalai Lama, which the government bans.

Tibet and neighboring areas are closed to the Western news media, so there was no independent way to verify the accounts.

According to Xinhua, the bloodshed on Monday began after members of the Qinghai public security bureau tried to detain men whom officials described as “insurgents seeking Tibetan independence.” It said that the men, residents of Dari County, resisted arrest and that in the ensuing gunfire, a police officer named Lama Cedain was killed. The account did not indicate who had shot the officer or whether the men being sought had weapons. Private gun ownership is extremely rare in China.