Shame! Shame! Shame on China! Olympic Torch Relay Became a Game of
Deception in San Francisco
Olympic Torch with Chinese Characteristics is Crowd Shy in San Francisco
-- Olympic torch evades protesters and sup****ters alike / Reiters
Olympic torch evades protesters and sup****ters alike
Wed Apr 9, 2008 10:42pm EDT
By Jim Christie and Amanda Beck
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The Olympic torch's only stop in North America
turned into a game of hide and seek on Wednesday as San Francisco
abruptly changed the route, angering both China sup****ters and protesters.
Thousands of people converged along the announced scenic Embarcadero
waterfront route. But after the opening ceremony, the first runner was
flanked by blue-clad Chinese security officials and carried the torch
into a warehouse. The torch eventually turned up miles away.
"We were cheated, because I think the meaning of the relay was to show
the whole world that our country is hosting the Olympics," said Michael
Huo, 30, a Chinese engineer working at a Silicon Valley start-up company.
The torch was a magnet last week for chaotic demonstrations in London
and Paris China's human rights record and its recent crackdown on Tibet.
Beijing, embarrassed as it prepares to host the Olympics, has strongly
condemned the protests.
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom told Reuters that the route had to be
radically changed at the last minute or the event canceled to ensure
public safety.
"We *****sed the situation and felt that we could not secure the torch
and protect the protesters and sup****ters to the degree that we wished,"
Newsom said by cell phone. "As a consequence we engaged in subsequent
contingency planning that we felt would keep people safe."
The bewildering changes united sup****ters and protesters who had been
divided by politics. Both sides were angered by the sudden changes to
the only North American leg of the torch's journey to the Beijing
Olympic Games in August.
"It's cowardly. If they can't run the torch through the city, it means
that no one is sup****ting the games," said Matt Helmenstine, 30, a
California high school teacher who carried a Tibetan flag.
CRUSHED OUR FREEDOM
After the torch initially disappeared from view, police boats and jet
skis hinted it might be headed up the waterfront by boat. But an hour
after the scheduled start, the torch appeared on a less scenic
north-south street more than two miles away.
A planned closing ceremony on the waterfront was scrapped and the torch
brought to San Francisco International Air****t, where few saw its
farewell.
In Beijing, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao told the International Olympic
Committee president Jacques Rogges that the Olympic torch is a "****ning
symbol of peace, friend****p and progress," the People's Daily, the
official newspaper of the ruling Communist Party re****ted.
A commentary in the overseas edition of the People's Daily condemned
protesters disrupting the relay. "To judge from the utterly crude
behavior of a few trouble-makers, they have nurtured no respect for
others or respect for the democratic majority, and lack a basic respect
for the law," said the front-page commentary.
The route for the torch relay on May 2 in Hong Kong, its first stop in
China, will be cut short "to avoid embarrassing scenes," Hong Kong's
South China Morning Post re****ted, quoting an unnamed government source.
San Francisco has a large Chinese-American population and many had
waited proudly to see the torch relay. In front of the city's ferry
building, Christine Lias, 30, was quickly surrounded by more than 30
Chinese-Americans after she yelled: "Free Tibet now!"
"Liar, liar, shame on you!" many in the group shouted.
On a beautiful spring day, San Francisco deployed hundreds of security
officers, including FBI agents backed up by police cars, harbor boats,
jet skis and helicopters.
Thousands of pro-China spectators gathered along the original planned
route, many flying the five-star Communist Chinese flag alongside U.S.
and Olympic flags.
"In 5,000 years of Olympic history the Chinese can finally have one time
hosting the Olympics. It means that China is becoming a world power,"
said Don Zheng, 41, a Chinese-American computer engineer who emigrated
in 1988.
DELICATE DIPLOMACY
The torch relays have attracted many groups unhappy about a range of
China-related issues, including Tibet, its human rights record and
policies on Sudan's Darfur region. Critics say China should use more of
its clout with Sudan to ease the bloody conflict in Darfur.
China blames Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, and his
associates for orchestrating monk-led protests in Tibet last month as
part of a campaign for independence. The Dalai Lama denies this.
Hours before the San Francisco relay, President George W. Bush urged
China to open a dialogue with the Dalai Lama. Bush and other Western
leaders are facing a delicate balancing act as calls mount for them to
boycott the Olympics opening ceremony.
(Take a look at the Countdown to Beijing blog at
http:blogs.reuters.com/china)
(Writing by Adam Tanner; additional re****ting by Duncan Martell, Robert
Galbraith, Erin Siegal and Philipp Gollner in San Francisco, Richard
Cowan in Wa****ngton, Guo ****peng and Nick Mulvenney in Beijing, Lucy
Hornby in Xiahe and John Ruwitch in Hong Kong; editing by Frances Kerry
and Todd Eastham)
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN0842217920080410
|
