By Wing-Gar Cheng
June 20 – The Beijing Olympic Games torch will be flown to Tibet today for a shortened relay tomorrow through Lhasa, the regional capital hit by anti-China protests in March.
“Lhasa’s residents of various ethnicity are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the sacred Olympic flame,” the Beijing Olympics Organizing Committee said in a statement.
The relay was reduced to one day and limited to Lhasa as part of a rescheduling following the May 12 earthquake in Sichuan province that killed more than 69,000 people and left about 17,400 still missing. The torch had been scheduled to pass through Tibet’s Shannan region and Lhasa on June 19-20.
Anti-China demonstrations erupted in Lhasa on March 10 as Buddhist monks demanded an end to religious restrictions and the freeing of imprisoned colleagues in protests timed to coincide with the anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.
“The torch will be showcased in Lhasa” during its Tibetan leg, the organizing committee said in a statement on its Web site late yesterday. The flame arrives in the Tibetan capital after a three-day run through the western region of Xinjiang.
Games organizers suspended the relay for three days in May to mourn the victims of the earthquake, China’s strongest in 58 years, and postponed the Sichuan leg to August from June.
The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader, appealed to Tibetans not to disrupt the relay when it passes through Lhasa.
“Over a billion Chinese brothers and sisters feel very proud of it,” he told reporters in Sydney, Australia, June 12. “We must respect this, therefore we should not disturb it.”
The government in Beijing accuses supporters of the Dalai Lama of trying to sabotage the Aug. 8-24 Games.
