Beijing, Oct. 25 (AP): Chinese authorities have detained three persons accused of escorting Tibetan asylum-seekers to India, a US-based broadcaster reported today.

Police in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, detained two local residents on October 9 and a Nepalese sherpa the next day, Radio Free Asia said on its website, citing unidentified sources.

It said they were accused of helping the Tibetans leave for India, where their exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, lives.

The report follows a September 30 incident in which Tibetan asylum-seekers said Chinese border guards shot at them as they were leaving the country, killing at least one person.

Radio Free Asia did not say whether the reported detentions were related to that incident. It identified the Tibetans as Tashi and Yedor.

Zhang, a man who answered the phone at the Tibet regional police headquarters in Lhasa, said he knew of no such detentions. Calls to the regional government office were not answered.

Thousands of Tibetans have left for Nepal or India since communist forces occupied their Himalayan homeland in 1951.

Radio Free Asia said 53 Tibetans were detained this month while they were trying to flee to Nepal.