“…China sought to curb growing nationalistic fervor Sunday calling for “calm” even as new protests flared with thousands of demonstrators targeting French retailer Carrefour…Carrefour’s chief executive Jose Luis Duran said there has been ‘no significant impact’ economically, but the company is ‘taking the situation very seriously’…”

Source: International Herald Tribune

China sought to curb growing nationalistic fervor Sunday calling for “calm” even as new protests flared with thousands of demonstrators targeting French retailer Carrefour.

Over the past two days, protests have been staged in front of Carrefour outlets in nine cities across the country, including Beijing. Demonstrators have threatened boycotts of the retailer, who they have accused of supporting the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader - something Carrefour has denied.

A front-page editorial in the People’s Daily newspaper, the official mouthpiece for the Chinese Communist Party, urged people to cherish patriotism “while expressing it in a rational way.”

“As citizens, we have the responsibility to express our patriotic enthusiasm calmly and rationally and express patriotic aspiration in an orderly and legal manner,” the commentary said.

The editorial seemed to reflect concern among China’s leaders about a growing anti-Western backlash, fueled by anger over recent demonstrations in Paris, London and San Francisco during the Olympic torch relay. The relay has become a magnet for protests against China’s rule in Tibet and its human rights record.

Public anger in China has also targeted Western media, especially broadcaster CNN, for what is perceived as biased reporting on recent unrest in Tibet.

Beijing’s move to rein in the budding nationalism follows similar patterns seen in the past, including during the 1999 bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade by the U.S., the 2001 incident when a U.S. spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet, and the 2005 anti-Japanese protests, said Barry Sautman, a political scientist at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

“The government allows people to vent … but then immediately reins it in,” he said. “They are certainly afraid it will go too far.”

With the Olympics this summer, “that’s why they want demonstrations to be very short. They want to wrap them up as soon as possible so they can go on to restore the image of China as welcoming to people around the world,” Sautman said.

On Sunday, more than 1,000 demonstrators carrying banners gathered for a second day in the tourist city of Xi’an in front of a Carrefour outlet, chanting “Oppose Tibet Independence,” “Go China,” and “Condemn CNN,” the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Protests also continued in central Wuhan for a second day, when another 2,000 people, mostly students, waved the Chinese flag and sang the national anthem.

Rallies were also staged in the cities of Harbin, Dalian, and Jinan. An estimated 1,000 demonstrators blocked traffic in Dalian, while another 1,000 protesters in Harbin held up at a 33-foot-long banner in support of the Olympics, Xinhua said. Hundreds of police were monitoring the demonstrations in the five cities, which remained peaceful.

Xinhua reported that one protest organizer in Xi’an, identified as Wu Sheng, said the demonstrations were not necessarily aimed at pushing customers to boycott Carrefour.

“We do not support a boycott of French companies because the economy is globalizing. We chose Carrefour’s front doors only because we draw more attention there,” Wu was quoted as saying.

In an interview published Sunday in Journal du Dimanche, Carrefour’s chief executive Jose Luis Duran said there has been “no significant impact” economically, but the company is “taking the situation very seriously.”

With 2 million Chinese customers, “we cannot take the reaction of some of our clients lightly,” he said. “It must be understood that a large part of the Chinese population has been very shocked by the incidents that have peppered the passage of the Olympic torch through Paris.”

Duran also again denied any connection to the Dalai Lama, saying Carrefour has never supported any political or religious cause. The retailer is the second-largest hypermarket in the world after Wal-Mart Stores Inc. It has 122 stores in China employing 44,000 people.

The protests had begun on Saturday, erupting in Beijing and five other major cities - Hefei, Wuhan, Kunming, Xi’an, and Qingdao.

In Beijing, small protests broke out at one Carrefour and outside the French Embassy as well as the Beijing French School. Dozens of police, some in riot gear, quickly dispersed the crowd in front of the embassy.

Anger has also been channeled against Western media organizations, including CNN and the BBC, for so-called “distorted” coverage of recent unrest in Tibet and neighboring provinces. Foreign journalists have received threatening phone calls and e-mails.

Several thousand ethnic Chinese protesters marched outside CNN’s Hollywood, California office Saturday to demand the firing of a commentator who recently compared China’s leaders to a “bunch of goons and thugs.”