The story

A proud China invited the world to the 2008 Beijing Olympics with a dazzling song-and-dance and fireworks display, but cheers and shouts of 10,000 beaming citizens could not mask fears about pollution.

The crowds gathered on the vast Tiananmen Square, overlooked by a giant portrait of Mao Zedong, the founder of Communist China, in front of a brightly lit Gate of Heavenly Peace, exactly a year before the Games begin.

Police, some with sniffer dogs, had to force back the hundreds who milled around the edges hoping to get a glance of the festivities, watched by Chinese leaders and International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge. Read full article »

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