CHINESE internet users appear to have been allowed an unprecedented degree of freedom in the wake of last week's devastating earthquake, but some comments continue to be censored.

Internet posts questioning the disproportionately high number of children killed in last Monday's earthquake and criticising the distribution of aid to affected areas have been appearing on Chinese websites since the disaster.

"Why were most of those killed in the earthquake children?" asked one user on FanFou, a Chinese microblogging website similar to Twitter.

An unusually high number of schools in Sichuan province collapsed during the earthquake, crushing thousands of students while nearby government buildings remained standing.

Questions about the quality of building materials in schools that collapsed have been at the forefront of online discussion since the quake, prompting authorities to engage with criticism in a rare concession.

Last week government officials held a real-time exchange with Chinese internet users to answer angry questions over the school collapses, the Associated Press reported.

"I don't want to use the word transparent, but it's less censored, an almost free flow of discussion," said journalism professor Xiao Qiang at the University of California in Berkeley.

Mr Xiao is the director of the China Internet Project, which monitors online media and internet communities in China and runs the China Digital Times website.

"They (the authorities) understand better now that to react slowly or to cover up in the internet age is a bad idea," Mr Xiao said.

China is known for its often heavy-handed approach to censoring internet access and online opinions, including blocking access to foreign media websites, filtering results on search engines such as Yahoo and Google and suppressing comments critical of authorities on blogs and chat forums.

While some critical comments have been allowed since the Sichuan quake, others have been censored.

Up to 17 people have been detained, warned or forced to issue apologies for online messages that "spread false information, made sensational statements and sapped public confidence" in the last week, state news agency Xinhua reported.

"I would find it hard to believe that the government has relaxed their control," said Macquarie University doctorate student Christine Maunder, who is researching the internet in China between 2005 and 2007.

"They have worked too hard to put the barriers to the country's intranet in place."

Ms Maunder said there were precedents for Chinese authorities allowing specific complaints to be aired online and none of the comments published in the wake of Monday's quake seemed remarkable.

"The Chinese censorship has always been not only efficient but also subtle," she said.

"We need to view what happens on the internet in China for a lot longer than a few days to make those judgments, as these controls are so embedded."

One comment deleted from an online forum called Tianya had been critical of the government response to the quake, the Associated Press reported.

"A politician visited Dujiangyan for less than two minutes, and police kept the people away. Most residents don't even know he ever came!" the post said.

"Who can tell me, where is the food and water that is being promised by the city government."

A Tianya worker told the news agency posts may be deleted for containing "sensitive words" or not being "relevant to the theme of discussions", but would not say exactly why the post was removed.

On other forums, users have started to compile lists of the schools that collapsed in the Sichuan province in the absence of an official register.

Chinese authorities have so far been relaxed about media coverage of the disaster, going so far as to encourage local governments to aid reporters in filing "in-depth" stories about events, China Digital Times reported.

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