Shrugging off violent protests that have shaken Tibet, China said that the Olympic torch would go through the Himalayan region as planned on its way to August's Beijing Games.

"The situation in Tibet has essentially stabilised, the Olympic torch relay will proceed as scheduled," Jiang Xiaoyu, executive vice president of the Beijing Organising Committee for the Olympic Games, told a news conference. "Please be assured that whatever happens in ... Tibet, those events will never affect the normal operations of the torch relay."

The crackdown on the protests in Tibet and neighbouring Chinese provinces, which may have killed dozens of people, have sparked calls for a boycott of Beijing's showcase Games.

China accuses the exiled leader of Tibetan Buddhists, the Dalai Lama, of orchestrating the rash of monk-led protests and rioting - the most serious in the Himalayan region for nearly two decades - in a bid to wreck the August 8-24 Games.

Tibet's Communist Party secretary, Zhang Qingli, lashed out at the Dalai Lama, warning "we are engaged in a fierce battle of blood and fire with the Dalai clique, a life-and-death struggle between the foe and us".

"The Dalai is a jackal in Buddhist monk's robes, an evil spirit with a human face and the heart of a beast," Zhang told a teleconference of the region's government and Party leaders, according to the China Tibet News.

The spiritual leader denies he masterminded the protests -- which culminated last Friday in a riot in the capital of Tibet, Lhasa - from his base in the Indian town of Dharamsala. He says he wants greater autonomy for his homeland, not independence, as China suspects.

His government-in-exile says 99 people died when Chinese security forces moved to quell the riot, but Beijing says 13 "innocent civilians" were killed in the violence.