"We have organised a trip for more than 10 foreign journalists to understand the incidents there," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters, adding that the media delegation would depart on Wednesday.

"The organisers will arrange interviews with victims of the criminal acts and also visits to those places that were looted or burned," he said, when asked whether the reporters would be allowed to report freely.

Beijing says the deadly rioting that began in Lhasa and spread to Tibetan-populated areas elsewhere in China was orchestrated by the exiled Dalai Lama rather than an expression of popular anger at Beijing's heavy-handed rule.

It has also maintained that security forces have used minimal force in putting down the unrest.

However, China has effectively barred travel to the restive regions, preventing foreign media from investigating and confirming its claims, while excoriating foreign media for non-objective reporting.

The reporting trip, described by participating media as a three-day visit, would involve only a handful of media organisations, not including AFP or some other major news agencies.

Qin said logistical issues constrained the number of journalists allowed on the visit.

"I believe that through this visit, the press can enhance its understanding of the true nature of the incidents in Lhasa," he said, adding that further trips might be arranged later.

China's foreign correspondents association criticised the trip as insufficient.

"Our request is unrestricted media access to Tibet. Clearly this trip is better than nothing but it is far from satisfying our request," Melinda Liu, president of the Foreign Correspondents Club of China, told AFP.

She added that the continued reporting restrictions violate rules introduced last year to free up the activities of foreign reporters in an Olympics-related gesture of openness.

"Clearly this is not only not in keeping with the spirit of the guidelines, but it falls far short of what the international community expects from an Olympic host nation," said Liu, Newsweek magazine's Beijing bureau chief.

Free-Tibet activists say the unrest was triggered when police moved in to disperse a peaceful march on March 10 by Tibetan Buddhist monks marking the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising.

However, China's state media has made virtually no mention of those events, instead launching a relentless campaign to depict the rioting as the actions of a few "criminal" malcontents.

China moved in to "liberate" Tibet in 1950, formally annexing the region the following year. It drove the Dalai Lama into exile eight years later with the crushing of the Tibetan uprising.

Pro-Tibet groups say China is effectively extinguishing the region's unique culture through repression and a policy of officially encouraging immigration by ethnic Chinese.

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