EIJING, May 8 — With the giddy joy of a graduation party, some 400 students, teachers and workers emerged today from two weeks' quarantine at a university in central Beijing, providing some of the first cheerful television images from the SARS epidemic.

Even so, there were 94 more confirmed cases of severe acute respiratory syndrome today in this frightened capital, and a Communist Party leader said more than 120 officials around the country had been fired or disciplined for a "lack of vigor" in containing the virus or for concealing local cases.

Many of the students released from isolation at Northern Jiaotong University whooped and threw bouquets into the air, though others seemed more weary and left dormitories with bags of dirty laundry.

The city government did its best to turn the moment into a morale booster. A lineup of national and local officials gave short talks and then tried to lead the crowd in a patriotic hymn, "Sing to the Motherland." Students were given flags to wave, and young Communist Party members and aspirants handed out bouquets.

All of the nation's major news media were invited, and the scene was broadcast live on Beijing television.

"I don't know if all this ceremony was necessary," said Liu Qiang, a freshman in computer sciences, "but we don't care. We're just happy to be let out of our dorms." Some students said privately that their joy was tinged with anger at the official laxity in previous months, when SARS was silently spreading while the government said it was contained.

During their 15 days of isolation, the dormitory residents were allowed to play basketball or walk around in a courtyard. They watched television and had food delivered in, and most said that while it had been hard to endure their situation at first, they had gotten used to it.

Three dormitories at the university, which emphasizes technical subjects, were sealed off in late April with 373 students, 4 teachers and 23 workers inside after SARS cases appeared. At least 12 students at the university became ill, while another seven are still listed as suspect cases, official reports said today.

Fan Miao, a senior in the law department and one of those tapped to deliver flowers to the freed dormitory residents, put the most positive face on the event, saying, "This is a happy day, a victory, one successful battle in the war against SARS."

A quarantine was also lifted today at a building of the Central University of Finance and Economics, which appears to have been the hardest struck of the schools in the capital, with 19 students and staff members becoming ill and two people, both retired teachers, dying from SARS.

Beijing, the new global epicenter of the epidemic, has not had much to cheer about in recent weeks, and today, apart from the relaxing of the quarantines at the two universities, was no exception.

China reported six more deaths from the contagious respiratory disease, raising the national death toll to 224 and lifting the global toll past 500 mark. Shanghai, which has had only a handful of cases so far, reported its first SARS death.

The confirmation of 94 more cases in Beijing was in line with the recent trend of close to 100 new patients a day, bringing the city's cumulative total to 2,136. Overall, China has now reported 4,698 confirmed cases.

International experts say they are unsure when the spread of the virus in Beijing will start to taper off, as it did in Guangdong Province, where the disease first appeared last fall, and then in Hong Kong.

The Chinese government initially tried to play down the extent of the SARS epidemic, especially in Beijing. But in April the surging caseload in city hospitals and a growing global outcry about official dissembling led to a striking about-face.

On April 20 officials acknowledged that Beijing already had several hundred cases, and the health minister and Beijing's mayor were both fired. Belatedly the city began an aggressive policy of quarantines for people exposed to the virus, but cases have continued to surge. No other senior officials have lost their jobs, though many must have known the truth about the disease's reach. But in many cities and provinces, a report from the government press agency disclosed today, at least 120 officials have been dismissed or disciplined for shortcomings in the SARS battle.

"This is the first time in China that during an emergency incident officials have been dismissed for dereliction of duty on such a wide scale," said an unnamed leader of the Communist Party Organization Department, according to the report by the official New China News Agency.

The greatest fear of Chinese and international health officials now is that SARS may start spreading fast in China's vast, medically underequipped interior provinces. So far, the most significant known spread outside Beijing and Guangdong Province has occurred in the impoverished provinces of Shanxi and Inner Mongolia.

The World Health Organization announced today that it was extending its warning against nonessential travel to Inner Mongolia, Tianjin municipality and Taipei, the capital of Taiwan.

There were reports today of another violent protest by Chinese citizens trying to prevent centers for SARS treatment or quarantine from being placed near their homes.

The latest incident, in the city of Chengde, 110 miles northeast of Beijing, was one of several reported by foreign news organizations but hushed up by the authorities.

Rioters in Chengde overturned an ambulance and smashed medical equipment and windows on April 27, Reuters reported today. Twenty-seven people are being detained for up to 15 days, and 13 others may face jail, a local official said.