p2pnet news | Freedom:- Ongoing protests over China’s military assaults on Tibet mean the Beijing Olympic torch relay may be cancelled.

IOC president Jacques Rogge says he’s “deeply saddened” by violent protests in London and Paris, and concerned about tomorrow’s torch relay in San Francisco, according to the Times Online.

In Paris, the torch had to be doused and in London, Sebastian Coe, chairman of the London Olympic Committee, described Chinese “officials” guarding the Olympic torch, “as ‘thugs’, piling more embarrassment onto the Games’ organisers,” says the Telegraph.

Canadian Students For a Free Tibet activists blogged they achieved another landmark in their Olympics campaign.

“We started the day at the crack of dawn, driving towards the Golden Bridge while watching a live stream video of the banner hang in Paris uploaded by our colleagues,” they say, going on >>>

We were thrilled to see the video of Mel Raoul (a Canadian who also did the banner hang on the Great Wall of China in August) and Phil (a British SFTer) unfurl a French banner which read “Pas de Flamme au Tibet” or “No Torch through Tibet.”

A few hours later, a team of seven SFT members/ Tibet activists unfurled two of the largest banners I have ever seen on the Golden Gate Bridge against a cloudless blue sky. It was stunning sight.

Two days before the Chinese Olympic Torch arrives in San Francisco, we had put our message on the most recognizable landmark in San Francisco. And our message was clear – we reject the Torch; we reject it here and we reject it going into Tibet.

Then came the media interviews, one after another, non-stop. Shortly after (they were a little slow on getting there) we were sized up by a fair number of Chinese ‘observers.’ But it didn’t matter anymore – we had won already – a small victory but another piece of a global message to China that until they resolve the issue of Tibet, they will have to hear us Tibetans and our supporters protest loudly at every opportunity.

Ali Taub (another Canadian, 22 year old, from Vancouver) was detained with three other support members shortly after the climbers left the ground. The three climbers were then detained after coming down voluntarily. As of right now, all of them are incarcerated and have been charged a number of different charges, and we’ve got a legal team monitoring the situation.

This was an amazing day and it’s almost over, but our work with Beijing’s disastrous Torch Relay in San Francisco certainly isn’t – in fact it’s just beginning.

Beijing, we are ready.

The IOC executive board will meet on Friday to decide whether or not to allow the torch to continue its 21-country journey.

Slashdot it!

Times Online – IOC may scrap Olympic torch relay over protests, April 8, 2008
Students For a Free Tibet – Canadian activists hang banners in Paris and on the Golden Gate Bridge, April 7, 2008
Telegraph – Chinese torch guards are ‘thugs’ says British Olympic chief, April 8, 2008

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 8th, 2008 at 5:30 am and is filed under Freedom, P2P. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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