A pro-Tibetian activist protests next to Acropolis hill while the Olympic flame arrives to Parthenon in Athens. (Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images)

As the Beijing Olympics approach China finds itself in the global spotlight but not for the reasons its government imagined when it was awarded the games of the XXIX Olympiad seven years ago.

World leaders queue up to condemn the Chinese response to the latest protests in Tibet. They have been joined by Hollywood celebrities such as actor Richard Gere, who has championed Tibetan nationhood for decades and is now the Chairman of the International Tibet Campaign.

According to Tsereng Tashi, the London representative of the Dalai Lama, leader of Tibet's government-in-exile, Tibet is now under martial law with hundreds killed by Chinese troops and many more injured.

Appeal to United Nations

Mr. Tashi has heard reports that Chinese authorities have cut electricity and water to some Tibetan monasteries. He says Chinese efforts to build roads and railway links into Tibet are designed to bring in Chinese immigrants and settlers to the region, transforming the Tibetans "into an insignificant, powerless minority in their own country."

He wants the United Nations to send an independent delegation to Tibet to study the situation. Cynics would say not much has changed since the days of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing when Chinese soldiers killed hundreds of opponents to the Chinese Communist Party regime.

Dick Pound, former vice president of the International Olympic Committee, admits there was discussion of human rights in China among IOC members, but he defends the decision to award the games to Beijing over Toronto, Paris, Istanbul and Osaka.

Mr. Pound says when the Games were awarded, Chinese Olympic officials acknowledged human rights was a prominent issue, but believed that exposure to the world's media might inspire the country to improve the situation.

Regardless, China is attempting to quash the protests with force even as the Dalai Lama himself has threatened to resign as leader of the Tibetan people if they continue to use violence in their protests.

Mr. Tashi warns the West to be skeptical of China's remarks that the Tibetans are happy with their lot.

"Why do 3,000 Tibetan men, women and children escape over the Himalayas every year risking their lives for freedom?" he asks. "It is a very serious situation and for the Chinese government to repeat the same old rhetoric that 'Tibet has been part of China for centuries'; that doesn't withstand the reality of history."

Chinese-Canadians defend homeland

Chinese-Canadians have leapt to the defence of their homeland, claiming that the western media is biased against the Chinese Communist Party. Several hundred gathered in downtown Toronto on March 29 to sing nationalist songs and draw attention to their position.

Larry Li, 39, is a computer IT specialist in Cambridge, Ontario, who took part in the famous demonstrations at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Students initiated the protests, he says, but were soon joined by others.

"We were just kids," says Mr. Li. "We wanted any kind of freedom, and the other part was not having to go to school. People were not happy with the economic situation, they thought it could be better and they needed to vent their rage and that led to Tiananmen Square."

Mr. Li came to Canada because his father "wanted me to see the world." He and his wife became Canadian citizens but travel freely to China almost every year and their Chinese family often visit them in Canada.

Zhu Taoying, the Chinese Consul General in Toronto, defends her government's position on the public relations catastrophe that has befallen China.

"In China we only have 49 years of peaceful development," she told me, smiling. "However, some anti-Chinese forces like Tibetans and Falun Gong who have been used by political forces as weapons to attack China, do not like China to develop as Chinese people wish. They are not happy to see what we have achieved."

Ms. Taoying says Tibetan demonstrators began with "looting, burning and killing of innocent people on the street," which she calls "criminal activity." She says law and order must be restored. "Criminals should be charged according to law and any responsible government must protect the safety of their people, whether they are Tibetan or Han Chinese."

Tibetans remove Chinese flag

Ms. Taoying recalls an incident on March 10 when two Tibetan protesters illegally entered the consulate grounds on Toronto's St. George St., climbed the fire escape and took down the Chinese flag. The offenders have been charged.

She sees the booming Chinese economy as a sign of progress and says that in 2005 the central government eliminated a centuries-old agricultural tax for 60 per cent of the farmers who are farming lands allocated by the government.

All Chinese, she says, regardless of ethnicity, enjoy free education and by the end of 2008 all will have free medical insurance. These are "improvements in human rights," along with poverty-line subsidies, social welfare for the unemployed and the working poor.

Tibetans, According to Ms Taoying, already have these benefits. There are 56 ethnic groups in China, including the Tibetans. Ms Taoying says they enjoy the same rights as the Han Chinese majority (largest ethnic group in China, with 92 per cent of the population) and in some cases receive preferential treatment. When writing university entrance exams, Tibetans get extra points before they sit the exam, to make it easier for them to get into the main universities.

One-child-per family policy

In another example of Chinese multiculturalism, Ms Taoying says the controversial "one child per family" policy applies only to Han Chinese while ethnic minorities may have two or more children.

Regardless of whether or not one chooses to see the Chinese as victims of a global public relations strategy designed to embarrass them, there is no doubt that hosting the Olympic Games is going to have a dramatic effect on how the world views China and her 1.4 billion people.

"I don't think any country that has hosted the Olympic Games is ever the same again," says Canada's Dick Pound. "There's bound to be an impact. I mean, you are dealing with the most populous country in the world. It's not going to turn on a dime. It would be dangerous if it did."

Mr. Pound says the Olympics will accelerate progress on human rights issues in China but it won't happen overnight.

"I don't think you accomplish anything by isolating China and saying none of the rest of the world will come to your games," Mr. Pound says. "That would be really counterproductive in the circumstances."