Olympic torch arrives in Beijing without incident

BEIJING — The Olympic flame touched down in Beijing today amid high security before it leaves on a round-the-world relay expected to be a lightning rod for protests against China's policies and human-rights practices.

The arrival was shown live on state television, and comes a week after the lighting ceremony for the torch in Greece was marred by protests. There also were protests Sunday by a pro-Tibetan group when Greek officials handed over the flame to organizers of the Beijing Games in Athens.

The torch relay has been heavily promoted by the Chinese government. The chartered Air China plane was greeted at the Beijing airport by hundreds of schoolchildren waving Chinese and Olympics flags.

Chief Beijing organizer Liu Qi carried the flame off the plane and was greeted by Zhou Yongkang, a member of the Communist Party's supreme nine-man Politburo Standing Committee.

Authorities have given few details about a welcoming ceremony later today in Tiananmen Square, the heart of China's capital.

The flame's arrival in Beijing allows the government a brief respite before the relay sets off on a problematic, monthlong world tour. After a one-day stop in Beijing, the flame goes Tuesday to Almaty, Kazakhstan, the start of the 20-country, 85,100-mile global journey.

Tibetan and rights groups have said they will stage protests along the relay route, which includes stops in London, Paris and San Francisco over the next 10 days.

Dozens of Tibetan exiles burned an effigy of China President Hu Jintao as they reached the Indian capital of New Delhi on Sunday, carrying a symbolic flame that they said was running parallel to the official torch for the Beijing Olympic Games.

Some two dozen activists in Athens chanted "Save Tibet!" and unfurled a banner reading "Stop Genocide in Tibet" before police intervened, detaining 21 protesters outside the Panathenian Stadium. Most were later freed.

A police cordon prevented the demonstrators from disrupting the final leg of Greece's relay from the Acropolis to the marble stadium, the venue of the first modern Olympics in 1896.

Meanwhile, few details have emerged about a melee in Lhasa on Saturday that might have been sparked by police security checks.

"No one knows what happened. Just suddenly, all the people in the street began to run, including Tibetans, Han Chinese people and others," a hotel-room broker, who gave his surname as Zhu, said in a phone interview Sunday.

The International Campaign for Tibet quoted sources as saying the melee might have stemmed from an attempt by armed police to detain Tibetans and check their identity papers.

Information from The Washington Post is included in this report.