Taking a play from the Al Sharpton book of getting what you want:
The linked rings on every Chinese Coke bottle and the leaping athletes on each McDonald’s paper bag testify to the power the world’s biggest corporations believe this summer’s Olympics wields.
But having spent huge sums, the companies sponsoring the Beijing games are about to find themselves the targets of a new, more vigorous war on China’s human rights record by campaigners boosted by the success of protests along the torch relay route.
Yesterday a coalition of Tibetan groups warned Coca-Cola that it would be “complicit in a humanitarian disaster” unless it used its influence to ensure Tibet was dropped from the torch route. And tomorrow, Dream for Darfur will launch a critical “report card” on sponsors of the games.