Paris to greet Olympic flame with protest--mayor
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 19:01:00 04/02/2008
PARIS -- Paris city hall will unfurl a giant banner in defense of human rights when the Olympic flame arrives in the French capital Monday ahead of the summer Games in China, Mayor Bertrand Delanoe said.
"There will be a banner saying 'Paris defends human rights everywhere in the world' on city hall," Delanoe told a press conference on Wednesday.
The Socialist mayor said Paris hoped to defend the values "of all humanity and of human rights," saying all people "have the same right to dignity, and I am thinking in particular of the Tibetan people."
Pro-Tibet activists have called for protests over China's crackdown in the mountainous province at key locations during the Olympic flame's 19-country tour before returning to China.
The flame is expected at the Eiffel Tower in Paris Monday at 12:35 p.m. (1035 GMT), traveling around the south and west of the capital to the Charlety sports stadium.
The Reporters Without Borders (RSF) media rights group, which disrupted the lighting of the flame in Athens last month, said it planned to stage protests to mark its passage through Paris.
"Every time the flame crosses a city we will be there to say, 'Don't forget the reality of Tibet, don't forget the reality of China’," said RSF head Robert Menard, who is calling for a boycott of the August 8 Olympic opening ceremony.
Protests in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, on March 10 to mark a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule escalated into widespread rioting in the city, which then spread to neighboring Chinese provinces populated by Tibetans.
Other potential troublespots on the Olympic flame's worldwide journey include London on Sunday, San Francisco on Wednesday, the sole stop in the United States and New Delhi on April 17.
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