China’s Olympic torch route ignites an uproar

BEIJING —  China is calling it the “journey of harmony.” But the Olympic torch relay that is to precede the 2008 Beijing Summer Games and showcase the nation’s rise in world standing ran into discord as soon as the route was announced Thursday.

The path and its characterization by China drew the immediate wrath of Taiwan, where Chinese Nationalists fled in 1949 after a lengthy civil war.

“China has designated the Taiwan leg of the Olympic flame relay as a ‘domestic route,’ thereby creating the misimpression that Taiwan is a region under China’s jurisdiction,” Taiwan’s Olympic Committee said in a statement released late Thursday. “We resolutely reject this.”

Beijing, which considers Taiwan an inseparable part of its territory, is unlikely to change its plans. The mainland already considers it a political compromise that the torch’s route goes to Taipei, the Taiwanese capital, via Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam before turning back to Hong Kong in China.

“The Taiwan government is not happy because they consider this a very significant political message,” said Andrew Yang, secretary-general of the Chinese Council of Advanced Policy Studies, an independent think tank in Taipei. “Symbolically, it makes Taiwan part of China.”

The uproar underscores the political sensitivities involved in China playing host to the Olympics, which Beijing regards as a coming-of-age event crucial to its international standing.

In a nationally televised ceremony, organizers unveiled the Chinese Olympic torch in the shape of a slick red and silver scroll decorated with traditional cloud motifs. It was designed by Lenovo, China’s leading technology company, which acquired the computer division of IBM in 2005. It’s a nod both to China’s glorious past, as the inventor of printing, and a tribute to its economic and technical reach.

Beijing’s party secretary introduced the 130-day relay as “the longest, most inclusive, involving the most people in modern Olympic history.”

The 85,000-mile torch route crosses five continents and includes stops at the summit of Mt. Everest, the world’s highest peak, along the ancient Silk Road and in Pyongyang, the capital of secretive North Korea.

Beijing has vowed to do all it can to ensure that the Games proceed smoothly. Officials are determined to reduce traffic congestion and stop residents from spitting in public and speaking broken English. But politics are harder to control.

On Wednesday, police detained four protesters with the New York-based Students for a Free Tibet. In a reference to the Games’ theme slogan, they had displayed a banner reading “One world, One dream, Free Tibet,” at a Mt. Everest base camp. The protesters were deported, Reuters news agency reported today.

Beijing rules Tibet, which it claims as its own, and has suppressed independence efforts in the Himalayan region.

China faces threats of an Olympic boycott by critics who accuse Beijing of not doing enough to end the bloodshed in Sudan’s Darfur region. China is a major investor in Sudan.

Beijing warned against politicizing the Games.

“The Chinese people have been anticipating and preparing for the 2008 Beijing Olympics,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao. “Using any excuses or political reasons to boycott or oppose it would go against the broad goodwill of the international community.”

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Special correspondent Tsai Ting-I in Taipei contributed to this report.