Tibet's prime minister-in-exile urged the United States on Thursday to step up pressure on China after a wave of self-immolations, which he said showed the failure of Beijing's rule.

Lobsang Sangay, who was elected to the government-in-exile's new post as the Dalai Lama tries to ease out of his political role, met lawmakers in Washington while a nun became the 11th Tibetan monk or nun to set herself on fire this year.

Testifying to Congress, Sangay appealed to the United States "to prevail on the Chinese government to make them realize the tragedy unfolding in Tibet, that this kind of a hardline policy of the Chinese government is not working."

"I think it's high time that the international community realizes the gravity and the urgency of the situation," he told a commission on human rights named after late US lawmaker Tom Lantos.

Specifically, Sangay asked the United States to press for a fact-finding mission into the Kirti monastery at the center of the self-immolations, which has been strictly off-limits to visitors since tensions erupted.

Eight Buddhist monks and two nuns have set themselves alight in ethnically Tibetan parts of Sichuan province since the self-immolation of a young monk in March at Kirti monastery sparked a government crackdown.

Activists say that at least five monks and two nuns have died and that Chinese police have at times responded by beating the alight protesters and their colleagues rather than providing assistance.

China has accused the Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader who fled his homeland for India in 1959, of instigating the self-immolations in a form of "terrorism in disguise."

China has long sought to discredit the Dalai Lama, who enjoys wide popularity in Tibet and abroad. The Dalai Lama has in the past condemned self-immolations, which many Buddhists believe are contrary to their faith, but has kept a low profile over the recent wave of protests.

"Given a choice, anyone would like to live than die," Sangay told the US commission.

"When someone dies -- and dies in such an agonizing way -- the suffering inside and outside ought to be very, very strong and unbearable."

The Tibetan protests come amid a wave of unrest in the Arab world that has toppled three autocratic leaders, initially triggered by the self-immolation of a street vendor in Tunisia.

Tibetan monks in Sichuan, speaking to AFP reporters who managed a rare trip to the region last month, linked the self-immolations to China's refusal to negotiate seriously with the Dalai Lama.

The AFP reporters were not allowed to the Kirti monastery but said the complex was guarded by a large number of police in full riot gear carrying automatic rifles and iron bars.

The 11th Kyabje Kirti Rinpoche, the spiritual guide of Kirti monastery who also lives in exile in India, told the US commission that Tibetans felt a severe lack of freedom, with even mailing a letter enough to warrant arrest.

"Since they don't have any avenues to voice their feelings -- even to voice their feelings of what they do in a day -- therefore in desperation they have resorted to the ultimate way of drawing attention," he said.

"Most of the Tibetan majority lives in a situation which is like house arrest in any other country."

Maria Otero, the under secretary of state for democracy and global affairs, said that President Barack Obama's administration has urged China to address its "counter-productive" policies in Tibet.

"Senior State Department officials have consistently and directly raised with the Chinese government the issue of Tibetan self-immolations," Otero, who serves as US policy coordinator on Tibet, said in written testimony to a separate hearing of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

But Representative Frank Wolf, a Republican from Virginia, urged the Democratic administration to do more. He called on Gary Locke, the US ambassador to Beijing, to insist on visiting Tibet.

Locke should "not only go to Lhasa but go through the country and maybe hold a press conference when he's finished," Wolf said.