Beijing - China has sentenced 12 more participants in unrest in Tibet to prison, bringing the number jailed so far to 42, the official Xinhua news agency reported Friday.

The latest sentences were handed down June 19 and 20 in Tibet, said Palma Trily, China's executive vice chairman of Tibet.

He did not give the lengths of the jail terms but said no death penalties had been handed down.

The initial 30 Tibetans sentenced in April for the rioting that broke out in March in Lhasa, Tibet's capital, received terms ranging from three years to life in prison.

Another 116 people are on trial in the unrest, Xinhua quoted Palma Trily as saying.

"It would be decided under Chinese laws whether some would be sentenced to death," he said.

Demonstrations against Chinese rule broke out March 10, the 49th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising. Four days later, they escalated into rioting in Lhasa, in which shops belonging to ethnic Han Chinese were looted and set on fire.

The Chinese government said 18 civilians and a police officer were killed in the Lhasa rioting, all at the hands of the rioters, but the Tibetan government in exile said more than 200 people were killed in the demonstrations and Chinese crackdown, most of them Tibetans shot by Chinese police.

Since the unrest broke out, 953 people have been arrested, including 362 who turned themselves in, according to Chinese authorities. (dpa)