Amid growing tension over the Tibetan independence issue, the Olympic torch has been handed by Greece to the organizers of the Olympic Games hosted in Beijing, China. The event was a bit overshadowed by a group of protesters who tried to halt the ceremony but had no success.

Protesters were “armed” with Tibetan flags and anti-Chinese slogans and tried to stop the runner carrying the torch from handing it over the Chinese. They attempted to break through the police lines to do that but were stopped.

The ceremony took place at the Olympic stadium in Athens.

The Greek police was on high alert after several protesters gathered over the past week along the torch relay route from ancient Olympia.

The Chinese government received calls from the United Nations and several Western governments over the crackdown on the Tibetan protesters in Lhasa. The European Union’s foreign ministers also agreed on a joint response on Saturday during a meeting in Slovenia.

The EU urged China to renounce at its violent ways of dealing with these sorts of issues and called on its leaders to hold talks on Tibetan cultural and religious rights. Nevertheless, the European foreign ministers avoided mentioning the Beijing Olympics or calls for EU countries to boycott the event.

The Lhasa protests which turned violent sent a shock wave all over the world and many now fear that the road of the Olympic torch relay, which will be carried through 20 countries before the Beijing Olympics, will be more difficult as it could trigger more protests against China-Tibet issue.

Beijing refused to meet with the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader, despite international pressure to do so. The Chinese Government argued that the Dalai Lama is a "separatist" and he’s behind the protests that spread in Tibet and throughout the world.