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I love this banner: "Don't Torch Tibet"

FWD:


(Updates with Tibet protest in Sydney, quotes)

UPDATE 1-Olympics-Tibet protest as torch lands in Australia
Tue Apr 22, 2008 9:43pm EDT  Email | Print | Share| Reprints | Single
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http://www.reuters.com/article/olympicsNews/idUSSYD30432620080423

By Rob Taylor

CANBERRA, April 23 (Reuters) - Pro-Tibetan protesters beamed laser
signs onto the Sydney Harbour Bridge on Wednesday reading "Don't Torch
Tibet" and "China, talk to the Dalai Lama", as the Olympic torch
arrived in Australia under tight security.

A group of Tibetans who were on a hunger strike continued their 70 km
(43 miles) march to Canberra to rally against the torch as it landed
at an airforce base in the capital under security usually afforded
visiting world leaders.

Thousands of pro-Tibet sup****ters have promised to hold a peaceful
rally during Thursday's torch relay in Canberra, but thousands of
Chinese students were also expected to rally to sup****t China. Media
re****ts said the Chinese embassy had hired 20 buses to bring
sup****ters from Sydney and the southern city of Melbourne, an eight-
hour drive from Canberra, to counter protesters.

"We're in a democratic country. If people want to protest, that's a
matter for them, as long as they do it peacefully," International
Olympic spokesman Kevin Gosper told Reuters after watching the Olympic
torch arrive.

Hundreds of extra police have been called in to protect the torch,
which will be carried through closed-off and barricaded streets on
Thursday, with authorities determined to avoid the chaos that
disrupted the relay in Europe and the United States.

China had hoped the torch's journey would be a symbol of unity in the
run-up to the Beijing Games, but the torch has drawn anti-China
protests over human rights and Beijing's crackdown in Tibet, as well
as pro-China demonstrations.

Aborigine Bunja Smith, who presented Chinese torch officials in
Canberra with a traditional wooden message stick inscribed with the
word "Peace", said Australia's Aborigines had a long history of
repression and understood the need for protest.  Continued...