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Journalism of Courage
Argentine runners relayed the Olympic torch past fenced-off protesters on Friday, as hundreds of China supporters in red windbreakers tried to reverse weeks of bad publicity for the host of the Summer Games.
Activists opposing China’s human rights record unfurled banners and promised “entertaining surprises” but pledged to keep their demonstrations peaceful after protests marred stops in London, Paris and San Francisco.
Hundreds of spectators cheered as Chinese delegates wearing Argentina’s blue-and-white lit the torch from a lantern that has carried the flame from the site of the ancient Olympic games in Greece. Mayor Mauricio Macri held the slender aluminum torch aloft, then passed it to three-time Olympic windsurfing medalist Carlos Espinola, who jogged into Buenos Aires streets flanked by Chinese bodyguards. Heavyset police huffed to keep up.
A sea of about 500 China supporters in red windbreakers handed out by organisers waved banners and denounced what they called political interference in the ceremony.
