Production resumed on Tuesday at a factory owned by the manufacturer of Apple's iPhones in the northern Chinese city of Taiyuan following a brawl among workers as the company denied reports that a number of people had died in the violence.
Foxconn Technology Group spokesman Simon Hsing told Reuters that the company’s manufacturing facility was back to normal, with its production lines in full operation on Tuesday.
In a separate statement, the company denied reports from a Hong Kong news website and a Foxconn worker who spoke to RFA suggesting that several people had died in the mass riots.
In a statement to the NextWeb news website, Taiwan-owned Foxconn said there were "no employee deaths" in the fighting, which official media said was sparked by a dispute between workers from different regions of China in a dormitory building, resulting in 40 injuries, most of them minor.
NextWeb had reported that as many as 10 people may have died in the clashes, as microblog users uploaded photos of destroyed scooters, industrial equipment and street furniture, which they said showed the aftermath of the riots.
Meanwhile, a Taiyuan-based Foxconn worker surnamed Zhao told RFA's Cantonese service on Tuesday that seven people had died in the violence, which he said began after a Henan woman worker returned to the factory compound without her identity card after an evening of drinking, and was beaten up by security guards from Shandong following an altercation.
"Actually, seven people died," Zhao said. "I saw some of them with my own eyes, and I heard about some of them from others."
"More people died who were from Henan, although there were some from Shandong as well," he said, adding that "a large number" of people had sought emergency medical care.
Clampdown
Taiyuan authorities imposed a security clampdown in the streets around the factory after a halt in production Monday following riots involving around 2,000 workers.
Around 5,000 policemen were dispatched to the scene of the riots, which official media said began as a dispute between workers of different age groups in a dormitory building.
Police and company officials are still investigating the cause of the disturbance, but the Xinhua news agency said it was sparked by a fight between rival groups of workers who banded together out of loyalty to those from their hometowns.
Official Chinese media accounts also said no deaths had occurred, and that only three people had suffered serious injuries.
Zhao said the dead and injured had all been taken to a nearby People's Armed Police hospital, and that the company and the authorities had tried to hush up news of the deaths.
"Right now, the death toll is hugely sensitive," he said. "The company has forbidden us to tell anyone, or we will bear the full consequences."
"I am taking a huge risk in telling you."
Zhao said security remained tight around the factory on Tuesday.
"There are still large numbers of armed police around the area," he said. "There were several thousand dispatched here on Sunday, and they haven't left yet."
"They are staying inside the factory and in nearby primary schools and villages," he said. "All the armed police in Taiyuan were sent here, and all the roads are still sealed off."
Suicides
The Taiyuan facility employs 79,000 workers and manufactures the iPhone 5, according to labor protection group China Labor Watch.
The unrest at Foxconn, which is the world's largest contract maker of electronic goods, came after a series of labor incidents at the company's factories, including a string of worker suicides last year.
The company has been slammed for poor working conditions and mistreatment of employees at its China facilities, but says it has spent heavily in recent months to improve conditions and to raise wages.
While the company has said it is currently investigating the cause of the violence, online comments have blamed brutality on the part of the factory's own security guards.
Reported by Fung Yat-yiu for RFA's Cantonese service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.