Olympic Torch Protesters Attacked in South Korea
CHOE SANG-HUN
New York Times
April 28 2008

Thousands of young Chinese who assembled to defend their country’s troubled Olympic torch relay pushed through police lines here on Sunday, some of them hurling rocks, bottled water and plastic and steel pipes at protesters who were demanding better treatment for North Korean refugees in China.

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When a few protesters demanded that China stop repatriating North Korean refugees, they were quickly surrounded by jeering Chinese. Near the park, Chinese students surrounded and beat a small group of protesters, news reports said.

In another scuffle, at the city center where the five-hour torch run ended, Chinese surrounded several Tibetans and South Korean supporters who unfurled pro-Tibet banners, and kicked and punched them, witnesses said.

The largest scuffle erupted shortly after the first torch-bearer left the Olympic Park, surrounded by dozens of police officers on foot or on bicycles and hundreds more in buses and trailed by a water cannon, ambulances and helicopters overhead.

Many of the Chinese who had gathered at the park surged toward about 150 protesters, mostly old South Koreans and North Korean defectors, who were shouting, “No human rights, no Olympics,” from across a boulevard. Armed with plastic shields, the police scuffled with the Chinese as they tried to separate the two groups who were hurling objects at each other. At least one Chinese student was hauled away by the police for throwing a rock. A South Korean newspaper photographer was taken to the hospital with a cut on his head.