BEIJING: The public face of an ongoing crackdown on unrest in Tibet has been named the region's top legislator during a leadership shake-up in China's Himalayan region, state press reported Friday. Qiangba Puncog has stepped down as the chairman of the Tibetan Autonomous Region and has quickly been named head of Tibet's People's Congress, Xinhua news agency reported.

Padma Choling, 58, an ethnic Tibetan and a 17-year veteran of the People's Liberation Army, was also promoted by an ongoing congressional meeting to the chairman's job, it said. He had been a vice chairman since 2003.

As chairman, Qiangba Puncog served as the public face of a government crackdown on ethnic separatism in the region, which began following anti-China riots in Lhasa in March 2008.

China said 21 people were killed by "rioters", and that security forces killed only one "insurgent".

But the Tibetan government-in-exile, headed by the Dalai Lama, claimed that more than 200 people were killed and some 1,000 hurt in the unrest and subsequent crackdown.

At least 5,700 people were arrested during the period, the government has said, with many Buddhist monks given long prison terms.

Chinese troops invaded Tibet in 1950 and officially annexed the region a year later. The Dalai Lama, who fled his homeland following the 1959 uprising, has repeatedly accused Beijing of widespread rights violations there.

Although Tibet is nominally an autonomous region, its top leaders remain ethnic Han members of the ruling Communist Party. Regional party secretary Zhang Qingli is expected to retain his post in the ongoing reshuffle.

The ongoing crackdown has also spread to other Tibetan-inhabited regions of China such as Sichuan province where respected Buddhist lama Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche was sentenced to over eight years in jail for illegal possession of ammunition and embezzlement in December.

The monk has denied all charges, with supporters claiming the evidence was planted by police eager to silence the leading Tibetan spiritual leader.