BEIJING, May 19 (Reuter) - China has ordered an intensified crackdown on separatists and criminals in Tibet amid reports that anti-Chinese protests have been broken up and monasteries sealed off in the restive Himalayan region.

A renewed crackdown on crime should include a campaign to strike at pro-independence forces loyal to Tibet's exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, the official Tibet Daily said in a front-page editorial seen in Beijing on Sunday.

A Western tourist in Lhasa said most monasteries near the Tibetan capital appeared to have been sealed off following reports of a disturbance in the city last week.

The London-based Tibet Information Network (TIN), which liaises closely with dissenters in the region, said in a report that up to 80 people, at least 30 of them women, had been injured in a clash with authorities on May 14.

An official of the Lhasa People's Hospital dismissed TIN's report that two truckloads of wounded people had been taken there after the clash with authorities.

"I don't know anything about a riot or disturbance. There have been no wounded here," the official said.

Tibetan government and police officials could not be reached for comment. "There has been some kind of disturbance. I heard about 40 people were hurt," said the tourist, who declined to give his name. "Everyone is talking about it. Many of the temples are closed right now and we don't have access to them," he said by telephone.

Lhasa residents said on Saturday that Chinese officials had sealed off Ganden monastery, one of Tibet's largest, after anti-Chinese protests by monks in which dozens were reported arrested.

"The monks staged demonstrations at Ganden last week," said one resident who declined to be identified.

One monk was shot and wounded by police after fighting broke out at the 15th-century mountain-top monastery 40 km (25 miles) east of Lhasa, reports from the region said.

The demonstration erupted on May 7 after officials tried to impose regulations banning the display in temples of photographs of the Dalai Lama, who is still widely venerated among Buddhists in the deeply religious region, TIN said in a faxed statement.

An official reached by telephone on Saturday said Ganden had been closed for renovation.

"The biggest hidden danger to our region's stability and security is from the sabotage and trouble created by the Dalai Lama separatist clique," the Tibet Daily editorial said.

"Political incidents and some criminal cases fully expose their ugly faces," it said. "We must combine the crackdown against criminals with the struggle against such separatist political activities."

In a separate report, the newspaper quoted the President of Tibet's Higher People's Court, Bai Zhao, as saying judges should not shirk from imposing the ultimate penalty on lawbreakers.

"In dealing with criminals we must firmly punish those who deserve it, and firmly hand down the death sentence to those who deserve it, to strike the criminals a mortal blow," Bai said.

On May 10, four people convicted of violent crime and murder were executed in Lhasa after a public sentencing rally attended by 15,000 people, the newspaper said.

Another 17 people were sentenced to death or prison, it said but gave no further details.

Tibet has been rocked by dozens of riots and protests against Chinese rule in recent years. Monks and nuns have played a leading role in the demonstrations.

Beijing says its rule has improved life immeasurably for most Tibetans and has blamed much of the unrest on forces allied with the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet for India in 1959 after an abortive uprising against Chinese rule.