Beijing Olympic Games

AMSTERDAM, May 10 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of Chinese students and Chinese Dutch people held a rally Saturday on the Dam Square in downtown Amsterdam to voice their support for the upcoming Beijing Olympic Games.

Their faces and arms painted with images of China's five-star red flag and Beijing Olympics symbols, and demonstrators waved Chinese and Dutch national colors and chanted: "Welcome to Beijing, Welcome to China!"

People in their 70s, as well as kids in parents' arms, joined the three-hour rally which had the theme of "Welcoming the Olympics and focusing on China."

"I'm Chinese, I feel I should come," said Mrs. Zhao, who lives in Amsterdam and is six months pregnant. Joining her were Chinese Dutch and Chinese students from all parts of the country.

"It is the first time I saw such a big gathering of the Chinese community in the heart of the capital," said a Dutch onlooker. "The Chinese community is usually very quiet and I think it's a good thing for them to speak out," she said.

The square, which is in front of the Royal Palace, is overflowing with banners like "The Dutch Are Friends of Chinese," "Great Games, Zero Politics" and "One world, One Dream."

Fu Junwei, a law doctorate candidate at the Tilburg University who helped organize the rally, said Chinese students in the Netherlands felt insulted by some Western media's slanted reports about China and decided to do something.

"We can never sit idly by. We feel we should tell the Dutch people the truth and stop the mudslinging. The most important thing is to have discussions with the Dutch and show them a complete picture," he said.

Tens of thousands of brochures, leaflets and souvenirs about China and the Beijing Olympics were handed out at the rally. Several thousand of signatures, from Chinese and other ethnic backgrounds, were collected in support of the Beijing Games.

Some enthusiastic China fans of white skin listened to speeches at the rally. Jaap Dil, a Dutch process operator in the pharmaceutical industry, said he visited China twice, in 2000 and 2007, and saw a country undergoing enormous changes.

"China is developing very fast, faster than any other country in the world. I saw huge changes in the country, a lot of improvement, in environment for instance," he said.

Dil was holding a red Chinese flag and wearing a Beijing Olympics T-shirt, which he bought in China last year. "People should go to China, see with their own eyes and then make their point," he said.

Bento Mol, a Dutch IT project manager, said he would embark on a two-month "Olympics journey" across the Eurasian continent next month.

Forty-two people driving more than 20 vehicles will leave for China on June 21 and the "Going Dutch caravan" is scheduled to arrive in Beijing on Aug. 8, the day the Olympics opens.

"The Olympics is an international event and everybody should enjoy it. I don't see any point in boycotting the Games," said Mol, who was wearing a red T-shirt to express solidarity with China and the Olympics.

Fu Junwei was happy that many Dutch people helped with the preparations of the rally, such as translation of the slogans and leaflets, and many Dutch people signed on the Olympics banner which is to be presented to the Beijing Olympics Organizing Committee.

"The rally would not be half as successful as now but for our Dutch friends' support," he said