French comrades do well
by hakmao, 7 April 2008
The torch relay was called off in Paris today:
French demonstrators wrecked the Olympic torch parade through Paris, succeeding where their London counterparts failed.
Police were forced to cancel the last part of the route after having to extinguish the flame at least five times and move the torch into a bus to escape protesters.
The farcical scenes came after more than 3,000 officers had been deployed in an attempt to avoid the disruption that affected the London relay.
…..
At the start of the relay, on the Eiffel Tower’s first floor, Green Party activist Sylvain Garel lunged for the first torchbearer, former hurdler Stephane Diagana, shouting “Freedom for the Chinese!” Security officials pulled Garel back.
About 50 deputies from all French parties stood behind a banner reading “Respect Human Rights in China” as the torch passed the seat of the National Assembly[.]
Meanwhile Mayor of Paris Bertrand Delanoë, a socialist worthy of the name, displayed a banner reading “Paris defends human rights around the world” on l’Hôtel-de-Ville, and later
[C]ancelled a ceremony to mark the passage of the Beijing Olympic torch as officials draped a Tibetan flag over the city hall’s facade.
Mayor Bertrand Delanoë announced the cancellation just after Green party members of the city council hung out the Tibetan flag along with a black banner with the Olympic rings turned into handcuffs.
Monday 7 April 2008 at 19:18
Vive la France! (well - the people there demonstrating anyway).
Monday 7 April 2008 at 19:55
Olympic torch protesters scale Golden Gate Bridge
http://origin1.montereyherald.com/state/ci_8840372
Monday 7 April 2008 at 19:59
web cams
Here
http://cbs5.com/webcams/26.567212.html?wmid=0
and here
http://cams.exploratorium.edu:8010/1/control.html
report of events
http://sfist.com/2008/04/07/breaking_news_t_1.php
Monday 7 April 2008 at 21:02
One news source gives only five arrests in Paris—from the CRS! Compare 30 odd nicked by the heavy-handed plod in London. Plus the mayor of Paris doing his bit. What was Livingstone doing?
Monday 7 April 2008 at 23:51
What was Livingstone doing?
Having a quick snifter or three from a hip flask?
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 0:29
6
for what Livingstone was doing see the end of this vid clip
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/apr/07/olympicgames2008.china3
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 6:34
‘Don’t touch me!’ screams plod as he shoves some bloke who wasn’t touching him in the face. Not called the ‘filth’ for nothing then.
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 7:09
In Paris there was a banner which mentioned the Spratlys, 100-odd tiny bits of reef located between Vietnam, Philippines and East Malaysia.
Ken was glad-handing — what else should we expect from the former editor of the Labour Herald?
Condemnation of the treatment of workers - with no unions, no right to industrial action, forced to work for little or no pay in unsafe conditions? Denunciation of the absence of freedom of movement, assembly and expression? Complaints about illegal detention and torture, the laogai and laojiao, kangaroo courts and executions? Questions about forced sterilisation and organ harvesting? Criticism of colonisation and the régime’s propping up of similarly oppressive régimes? Of course not–to denounce the workers’ paradise on earth is to bolster imperialism.
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 7:30
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 12:44
Hinteresting — and to my mind yet more evidence of the craven British government’s attitude to the whole fiasco
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/08/2211158.htm
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 17:28
“Paris defends human rights around the world”
Ironic, given how much harder the Paris police came down on the protestors than the Met did.
Tuesday 8 April 2008 at 17:32
“how much harder the Paris police came down on the protestors than the Met did.”
No they didn’t.
http://scwr.blogspot.com/2008/04/they-order-said-i-this-matter-better-in.html
Wednesday 9 April 2008 at 11:51
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/flame-attendants-revealed-as-chinese-lsquoparamilitariesrsquo-806452.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article3671368.ece