Chinese families furious at being evicted from their homes to make way for a shopping mall have demonstrated in the streets of Beijing. They claim they’ve paid a huge personal price for the Olympic facelift. “We are not against the Olympics,” said one. “But they shouldn’t have destroyed my house, forcibly evicted me and left me homeless.”

Eventually uniformed police moved in to break up the street protest. Centuries-old districts have been knocked down to make way for a showpiece commercial complex housing the likes of Rolex, Nike and Starbucks. Attempts by houseowners to sue the authorities are being delayed until after the Games.

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