What was suppose to be a PR boost for the Chinese has turned into utter disaster; the Olympic touch relay went through Paris today and, three times, Oympic officials had to extinguish the torch amid Tibetan liberation protest. For the last leg of the run, the torch was brought on board a bus to protect it from protesters.
The NY Times' Katrin Bennhold and Elisabeth Rosenthal report:
Despite heavy security, at least one activist got within a meter of the pack of Rollerblading police officers crowding around the torchbearer. On several occasions, officers were seen tackling protesters. A police official quoted by The Associated Press said 28 people were arrested.
To view video footage of the protests and read how the story was covered per France 24, click HERE.
Lastly, I leave you, the reader, with a few questions: Are protesters, in effect, 'hijacking' the Olympics for political purposes? Should the Olympics be a time when all the world's countries come together and put political differences aside? Or would it be wrong to stand idle, and give China free PR while they exercise brutish rule over Tibet and continue to aid Sudanese government forces responsible for genocide?
One more: Do you think the protests would have been comparable had the Olympic games been held in the US this year?
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