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WASHINGTON: US President George W Bush is under growing pressure from the US Congress to stay away from the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Beijing.
As thousands of protesters took to the streets of San Francisco during the running of the Olympic torch to criticise China's human rights policies, politicians in Washington passed a bill calling on China to begin talking to the Dalai Lama.
Many Republicans supported the bill.
Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher said: "We've got people in San Francisco and elsewhere throughout the world who are part of that international debate, expressing the will to the people of the world. This is where the American people are at... Listen to the heart and soul of what the people of the United States are about."
Both Democrats and Republicans are telling President Bush to stay away from the Olympics altogether.
Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee said: "But we can do no less than what peace-loving people do. Protest, petition, demand, raise opposition and pass legislation to insist that the president acts. I want the president to make a major statement on human rights."
Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has also called for the president to boycott the opening ceremony of the Olympics.
But the White House has failed to clarify the president's current plans.
When asked if the president is going to the opening ceremony of the Olympics, White House press secretary Dana Perino said: "I would just leave it as how the president stated it. We haven't announced the president's schedule."
The President has previously promised the Chinese President Hu Jintao that he will attend the opening ceremony.
Bonnie Glaser of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said: "I think the Chinese would be truly shocked if the decision (was) reversed."
"The pressure will continue to build but I think if the situation does not really escalate - if there is not a great deal of violence - then I think the president will go and the reason that he will go is because he promised Hu Jintao that he would," she added. - CNA/ac
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