Wen shoe thrower in court

LONDON: A German student appeared before a British court yesterday accused of throwing a shoe at Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao during a lecture at Britain's Cambridge University.

Prosecutors say Martin Jahnke, 27, threw the shoe while Wen was speaking to Cambridge students on Feb 2, the last day of his state visit to Britain. It landed about a meter away from him.

Jahnke also interrupted the lecture by blowing a whistle, and prosecutor Caroline Allison said the incident had caused Wen and students "harassment, alarm or distress."

Jahnke, a pathology student at the university's Darwin College, denied the public order offence when he appeared before a district judge in Cambridge, the Press Association news agency reported.

Allison said what might have begun as lawful protest became "unreasonable behavior and an act of aggression".

"He was heard to say words to the effect that the university was prostituting themselves by allowing the premier to speak and referred to the premier as a dictator," Allison said.

"He picked up one of his shoes, a trainer, and he threw that trainer, which must have been with some force, onto the stage area a few yards from where the premier was standing.

"He maintained that this was a legitimate protest considering the crimes of the Chinese government."

Jahnke's lawyers failed in a bid to halt proceedings, arguing that the Chinese government had put pressure on the Crown Prosecution Service and police to prosecute.

However the judge ruled the prosecution was correctly brought and that the hearing should go ahead.

The hearing is scheduled to last for three days.