Beijing (AP): Chinese authorities are blaming a radical Islamic group for instigating recent protests in the restive western region of Xinjiang, state media reported.

Xinjiang leaders have accused the group Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami of spreading and posting ``reactionary'' leaflets and calling for people to demonstrate in Xinjiang's capital of Urumqi, as well as Hotan, Kashgar, and Kizilsu Kyrghiz Autonomous Prefecture, the China News Agency reported on its Web site late Friday.

The report said the group was responsible for plotting ``illegal'' demonstrations on March 23 in Hotan that had to be broken up by police.

Calls to authorities in Xinjiang went unanswered on Saturday.

Hizb ut-Tahrir advocates the creation of a worldwide Islamic state, but has claimed to disavow violence. The group has been banned in Russia and Central Asia, where it reportedly has a large following in the predominantly Muslim former Soviet republics.

The U.S.-government funded Radio Free Asia reported earlier that several hundred Uighurs were taken into custody March 23 after demonstrating in Hotan and a neighboring county.

RFA said demonstrators were demanding authorities not ban headscarves in the predominantly Muslim region, and that they stop torturing Uighurs and release all political prisoners. They were also protesting the death of a popular Uighur trader who had died in police custody, the report said.

The protest came as the government poured police and troops into Tibet and other areas to contain unrest in the wake of violent anti-government riots in Tibet's capital, Lhasa, in mid-March.

Like Tibet, Xinjiang is a region with a culture that is distinctly different from that of China's ethnic Han majority. The Muslim, Turkic-speaking Uighurs have long sought independence and many have been sentenced to long prison terms or death on separatism charges. China's ethnic Han majority dominate the region's economy and government.

Last month, state media reported that a woman confessed to attempting to hijack and crash a Chinese passenger plane from Xinjiang in what officials said was part of a terror campaign by a radical Islamic independence group, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement. The reports said the woman was a Uighur.