French consider a Beijing boycott

AS the Olympic flame passed through Paris yesterday, France's Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner again raised the prospect of the French President boycotting the Beijing opening ceremony.
"President (Nicolas) Sarkozy said that he is keeping all options open, that all the paths should be pursued based on how the situation develops" in Tibet, he told LCI television.
Mr Sarkozy and Mr Kouchner have said that France is open to different scenarios regarding the opening ceremony. But Mr Kouchner said France opposed a boycott of the full Olympic Games, claiming the French boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan achieved nothing.
The Olympic flame was to snake from the Eiffel Tower through the snow-sprinkled French capital last night. About 3000 French police were on hand to protect the torch relay amid the threat of "spectacular" protests, including plans by Paris's Socialist mayor, Bertrand Delanoe, to unfurl a giant banner over city hall in defence of human rights.
Torchbearers were to be protected by 65 motorcycle police, 100 firemen, another 100 police on roller blades and nearly 50 vehicles with more than 200 riot police. The tight security in France follows clashes between police and protesters in London the previous night, which reduced the torch relay to farce and ignominy.
More than 35 protesters were arrested and police were forced to reroute the procession to protect the 80 runners.
Despite nearly a year of planning and the deployment of 2000 officers, Metropolitan Police were unable to stop protesters breaking through the security cordon at vulnerable points.
In west London, the torch was nearly taken from former children's show presenter Konnie Huq, and two demonstrators tried to douse the flame with a fire extinguisher near Ladbrooke Grove. The torch was diverted from foot to a bus at St Paul's to avoid increasingly chaotic scenes.
Scott Earley Jr, from Glasgow, needed dozens of police to keep baying mobs from snatching the torch as he ran past Big Ben to Westminster Bridge. "Everyone was running at you. It was a bit weird," he said.
Fu Ying, the Chinese ambassador to Britain, was forced to run her stretch of the route through Chinatown after ditching plans to run through Bloomsbury, where hundreds of pro-Tibet protesters were waiting.
Police pushed protesters behind barriers 20m from the route to separate them from pro-Chinese groups waving red communist flags on the pavement.
Despite attempts to create a festival atmosphere, with bands, dance troupes and costumed dragons, the loudest shouts from Wembley to Greenwich were of "Free Tibet" and "Stop the Killing".
Beijing Olympics organisers yesterday criticised the London protesters, describing their actions as a "disgusting" form of sabotage. "A few Tibetan separatists attempted to sabotage the torch relay in London, and we strongly denounce their disgusting behaviour," said Sun Weide, a spokesman for the Beijing Olympic organising committee.
"The act of defiance from this small group of people is not popular. It will definitely be criticised by people who love peace and adore the Olympic spirit. Their attempt is doomed to failure."
San Francisco police said security would be noticeably tighter than in previous torch relays through the city in 1992 and 1996 when the torch relay begins its US leg tomorrow.
Activists demonstrating against China's human rights record have protested along the torch route since it began its 137,000km, 130-day odyssey from Ancient Olympia in Greece to Beijing for the opening ceremony, which is on August 8.
Protests in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, turned violent on March 14, and unrest quickly spread to other Tibetan-inhabited areas of western China. Beijing clamped down with a huge mobilisation of paramilitary police and has ignored international calls to hold talks with Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.
Mr Kouchner, who spoke with the Dalai Lama on Sunday, called yesterday for more discussions about the tensions in and around Tibet. "It is in opening the doors that we can change the situation," Mr Kouchner, a longtime humanitarian campaigner and founder of aid group Doctors Without Borders, said.
Meanwhile, International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said he was "very concerned" about the unrest in Tibet and other international issues surrounding the Games.
The extraordinary comments by Mr Rogge illustrate how the largest anti-government protests in Tibet in two decades are continuing to rock the Olympic movement, four months before the summer Games.
"The torch relay has been targeted. The IOC has expressed serious concerns and calls for rapid, peaceful resolution in Tibet," he said in a speech to the Association of National Olympic Committees in Beijing.
AP, The Times