Beijing, Jan. 16 (Reuters): China has sealed off a village in southern Guangdong province after days of protests over land grabs ended at the weekend in clashes with police that killed a teenage girl, two residents said today.

Last week’s protest came a month after police sent to quell a similar demonstration in another part of Guangdong opened fire, killing at least three people and as many as 20.

“They’ve blocked all the roads leading to the village and they searched our bodies and motorcycles,” a man surnamed Yang at Panlong village in Sanjiao township said by phone.

“We are not allowed to leave after dusk.”

Residents said police used electric batons, or cattle prods, when they tried to disperse a crowd of several hundred protesting against low compensation for their confiscated land.

“They turned off all the street lights and car lights before beating whoever they caught,” a villager surnamed Xu said by phone.“That includes the girl ? she was just 13 and she died.”

Yang echoed Xu’s accounts and said he would not believe it if he had not seen it personally.

Hong Kong media said the girl died of a heart attack after being hit with a cattle prod. A Sanjiao official confirmed her death but said it was unrelated and happened on Friday.

“People spread the word, but there was absolutely no police beating. It was just a heart attack and she died in hospital,” the official, who declined to give his name said. The demonstration began last Wednesday when several hundred staged a sit-in outside government offices, protesting at what they said were meagre payments for their farmland to make way for a Hong Kong company's factories.

A report by the official Xinhua news agency said there were initially 50 petitioners, but the number rose to about 100, who blocked a road, by Saturday, along with hundreds of “onlookers”.

“No one died in the incident ... and police used no tear gas or electronic batons or water cannon while dispersing the petitioners and onlookers,” the report quoted a spokesman in the nearby city of Zhongshan as saying.

Protests are becoming increasingly common as social tensions over the growing gap between rich and poor and corruption fuel unrest. In 2004, China reported 74,000 demonstrations of more than 100 people.

Land rights have been an especially explosive issue as rapid development means more and more farmland is taken for roads and factories.

Municipal authorities had ordered local officials to handle the Panlong protest calmly and avoid clashes, Xinhua said, adding two police officers and three villagers were injured when petitioners threw rocks and firecrackers.