The Olympic motto of Citius, Altius, Fortius - faster, higher, stronger - may have been intended as an inspiration for athletes but for this year's games hosts, China, it has also become a rallying call to suppress dissent in Tibet.

At an Olympic torch relay ceremony in Lhasa last week, the Tibetan capital's most senior Communist party official cited the 84-year-old motto to exhort listeners to crack down on "splittist" supporters of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader.