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发表于 2008-4-10 10:59:14
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Torch leaves San Francisco after surprise route designed to thwart protesters
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
(04-09) 17:18 PDT SAN FRANCISCO -- San Francisco leaders surprised thousands of supporters and protesters today by rerouting the Beijing Olympic torch run from its advertised route to a picturesque course that avoided the throngs of demonstrators along the Embarcadero.
The result was a much more low-key event than anticipated.
Some protesters caught up to the run along its surprise route, but most stayed at Justin Herman Plaza, where a closing ceremony was planned. That ceremony was canceled in lieu of a quieter affair at San Francisco International Airport. The torch is expected to leave for Buenos Aires on a China Airways flight.
The torch was originally scheduled to head from McCovey Cove along the waterfront to Fisherman's Wharf and back to Justin Herman Plaza. But after an opening ceremony, the torch was instead driven from McCovey Cove to Van Ness Avenue, where pairs of runners - buffered by dozens of police officers - carried it north to Bay Street and Marina Boulevard and onto Doyle Drive near the Golden Gate Bridge. That route was originally discounted by city officials as being too high profile.
The torch finally headed out of the city around 3:30 p.m. and arrived at the airport at 4:15 p.m. The motorcade bearing the torch was immediately whisked to a parking area near the international terminal and quickly placed off limits to the half dozen protesters and a clutch of news crews. Airport officials said a chartered Air China plane was due to pull up to the terminal at 6 p.m.
The route changes allowed city officials to avoid the majority of protesters who interrupted recent runs in Paris and London, though some people sprinted to catch up with the convoy as it reached the Marina district today.
But as word filtered through the crowds at Justin Herman Plaza that there would be no ending ceremony after all, many reactions ranged from deflated to flat-out angry.
"I am very upset," said Rosie Salis, 51, who came in from Foster City to see the relay. "There were lots of people here with their kids. They had to wait for four or five hours, and it's very disappointing."
Demonstrators, including Harper Honan who brought a Tibetan flag to the Embarcadero, were also upset. Honan rode her bicycle to Van Ness Avenue to catch some of the run, but said the city should not have changed the route.
"They want to purposely thwart any organized protest that had been planned," she said.
City officials said this morning that they planned to cut the relay route short because of the large number of demonstrators, but never indicated that they would completely change the course. City Hall sources familiar with the police response said the current route had been the plan since at least this morning, something the mayor denied.
The bait-and-switch was immediately blasted by Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, a vocal critic of Mayor Gavin Newsom's administration.
"Gavin Newsom runs San Francisco the way the premier of China runs his country - secrecy, lies, misinformation, lack of transparency and manipulating the populace," Peskin said. "He misled supporters and opponents of the run. People brought their families and their children, and (mayoral officials) hatched a cynical plan to please the Bush State Department and the Chinese government because of the incredible influence of money.
"He did it so China can report they had a great torch run," Peskin said. "It's the worst kind of government - government by deceit and misinformation."
The mayor, reached by phone near the end of the torch run, denied that city officials knew early this morning that the torch route would change.
Newsom said he met with torch runners shortly before the opening ceremony and asked them whether the route should be changed or the run canceled.
Newsom said he and Police Chief Heather Fong had decided to alter the route at 11 a.m., and changed it yet again when they realized throngs of people were massing in huge numbers - particularly around the ballpark, where the most intense clashes occurred.
"We felt it was in everyone's best interest that we augment the route," Newsom said. "I believe people were afforded the right to protest and support the torch. You saw that in the streets. They were not denied the ability to protest."
Peter Ueberroth, head of the U.S. Olympic Committee, was with the mayor during at least part of the torch run and praised the way the city handled event.
"The city of San Francisco, from a global perspective, will be applauded," he said.
The torch was lit at McCovey Cove around 1:20 p.m. and the first runner, surrounded by Chinese and American police, headed away from the crowd and into the Pier 48 building on the waterfront. About 20 minutes later, a convoy of vehicles, including vans and police on motorcycles, pulled out of the building and headed through downtown and the Tenderloin to Van Ness Avenue.
The convoy stopped at Van Ness Avenue and Pine Street and the torch - along with several runners - was unloaded from one of the cars. The runners, carrying the flame in pairs, then began to make their way north on Van Ness Avenue.
The torch was handed off every half-block or so to a new pair of runners.
As the route progressed, the crowds slowly grew. At one point, a knot of pro-Tibet demonstrators yelled, "Shame on China! How dare you represent China!" In return, a group of torch supporters yelled back: "They represent the U.S.!"
By the time the runners got to Broadway, the crowds were five people deep on the sidewalk, mostly screaming support and craning for good views beyond the police lines.
Nancy Chan of San Francisco, with her son Christian, 4, ran over to the route from her house two blocks away when she heard that the route was along Van Ness instead of the waterfront.
"This is a once-in-a-lifetime thing for us to see the torch," she said. "There is a lot of politics around it, but that is the great thing about America - the free speech."
Joan Woodaver, who works near Van Ness, saw on television that the route had altered, so she ran over with a sign reading "Free Tibet and Free Burma."
"I really admire the Dalai Lama, and I feel disturbed that the government of China treats people so poorly," said Woodaver, watching with her 12-year-old sons Jason and Jarron as the torch was trotted past her.
Thirty pro-Tibetan demonstrators caught up to the torch near Francisco Street, where several got in the way of one of the motorcycle police officers and were knocked over.
One woman in particular went down hard after a police officer was unable to steer away quickly enough and hit her with his front tire.
Early this morning, thousands of people gathered along the planned route on the Embarcadero, with pro-torch demonstrators facing off against protesters hoping to draw attention to the nation's human rights record. Many of the pro-torch demonstrators carried red Chinese flags and said they were bused in by the Chinese consulate and other pro-China groups, though others said they had come of their own accord.
Meanwhile, many of the protesters carried Tibetan flags and preached independence for the country. Others were on hand to support Burma or rail against China's backing of the Sudanese government in its war in Darfur.
Some of the most heated exchanges occurred in Willie Mays Plaza near the ballpark. But as it became clear that the torch would not be headed down the Embarcadero, tension also began to rise in the big crowd assembled in front of the Ferry Building.
Around 2:15 p.m., flag-waving pro-China demonstrators attacked a 7-foot-wide pro-Tibet sign hanging on the Ferry Building. A man tried to restore the sign, but a swarm of opponents surrounded him. Another man rushed from the crowd and grabbed one of the China flags from a protester, triggering a pushing match between the two sides. Eventually, the squabble dissipated and a pro-China man grabbed the Tibet sign and tore it clean off the wall.
Police said clashes related to the protests had been minor. But the situation was tense for hours before the run, and at least one person was detained in front of the ballpark this morning. A few hours later, a confrontation between the two sides escalated to a physical violence, when a San Francisco man named Kevin Johnson, 48, walked into a crowd of torch supporters and began yelling, "Communists!"
The crowd encircled Johnson and the confrontation escalated when Johnson pulled a Chinese flag off a man's backpack. Then, someone grabbed Johnson's throat and another person punched him in the face before police intervened and walked him to safety.
Earlier, pro-Tibetan protesters in the area complained that they had been pepper sprayed, although they didn't know who did it. San Francisco resident Matt Winger, 22, flushed his red eyes with water and said, "It stings like hell."
There were some questions this morning about whether police were allowing protesters to access Justin Herman Plaza, but officials said they were simply warning people that they could not guarantee their safety because of the large number of pro-torch demonstrators gathered there.
Chronicle staff writers Jaxon VanDerbeken, Wyatt Buchanan, John Koopman, Michael Cabanatuan, Robert Selna, Kevin Fagan, Michael Taylor, Reyhan Harmanci and Meredith May contributed to this report. E-mail the writers at wbuchanan@sfchronicle.com, cvega@sfchronicle.com, rgordon@sfchronicle.com and mlagos@sfchronicle.com. |
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