Newswire:

The Olympic Torch Protests Explained

A canceled parade, a botched ceremony, an embarrassed committee. What do all these protesters have against the ‘08 Olympics in Beijing?

Here are the incidents so far:

Paris: Yesterday, during the Olympic flame parade, protesters waving Tibetan flags forced French security to “snuff out the torch and rush it onto a bus at least five times” before finally announcing that “a vehicle [would] carry the torch for the entire last part of the route.” French President Sarkozy has said he is “open” to “the possibility of boycotting the Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing depending on how the situation evolves in Tibet.” [AP]

London: The day before in London, police arrested 37 people during the torch parade in which “one protester tried to grab the torch; another tried to snuff out the flame with what appeared to be a fire extinguisher.” [WSJ]

Athens: Activists disrupted the torch lighting ceremony in Athens by “unfurling a banner and calling for a boycott of the Beijing Summer Games.” [International Herald Tribune]

Coming Soon: The torch is “expected to face demonstrations in San Francisco, New Delhi and possibly elsewhere on its 21-stop, six-continent tour before arriving in mainland China May 4.”

Why they’re protesting:

Tibet: Activists and human rights advocates world wide are deeply troubled by China’s harsh crackdown on Tibetan protests against Chinese rule (at least 800 have been arrested…and that’s most certainly an underestimation). [Washington Post]

Darfur: China continues to supply weapons and cash to the genocidal regime in Sudan responsible for the massacres in Darfur which have displaced 2.5 million people and killed at least 200,000. [Reuters]

Human Rights: In 2001, the Chinese Olympic committee promised the ‘08 Beijing games would “help the development of human rights". They were wrong. The Olympics have triggered a massive crackdown on dissent, imprisonment of journalists, reckless use of the death penalty, and extreme censorship of the internet. Amnesty International says this brutality “is occurring not in spite ofthe Olympics, but actually because of the Olympics.”

The Chinese response:

Chinese officials blame the protests on “a few Tibet separatists” and say they “believe that all the peace-loving people in the world will support the torch relay.”

A word of caution: In the Washington Post, China correspondent John Pomfret writes, “China’s system feeds off this kind of adversity. The Communist regime has a peculiar genius for turning these types of threats into opportunities…The Chinese blogosphere has erupted in a chorus of patriotic cheering as the People’s Armed Police have flooded Tibetan zones.” [Washington Post]

Pomfret explains the point of view of a young Chinese blogger: “For 150 years, China has been beaten down and oppressed by foreigners. Once again, the foreigners are at it. And what’s worse, they have picked this moment – China’s moment – to do it. Not only do they want to weaken China, the party’s propaganda organs crow, they want to make it do something even worse. They want to make it lose face. In front of 1.4 billion Chinese.”

“China’s big year could be a lot bigger than the Party figured it would. But prepare for unintended consequences,” Pomfret said.

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