International Olympics Committee president Jacques Rogge said he expected some form of protest by athletes given the contentious nature of China’s human rights record and policies. The IOC was “not worried”, Dr Rogge said, because he felt confident “athletes will have common sense”.

The current fad for push-ups in China is just one example of the extraordinary lengths to which Chinese internet users - netizens, as they are called - have to go to skirt the country’s noose of censorship. Pitted against these efforts is the Great Firewall of China - or the Golden Shield Project, to give it its official name - which is intended to prevent, deter and detect anyone who reads, downloads or publishing reports deemed to challenge the government’s hold on power.

Singing nationalist songs and waving posters of their “Serb Hero,” around 15,000 right-wing protesters flooded into downtown Belgrade. Many carried banners and wore badges with Karadzic’s name and picture. Some chanted slogans against President Boris Tadic’s pro-Western government and called for his death.