Women confront China

A group of Indian women marched through the grounds carrying banners protesting prostitution, while other women plastered chairs with stickers saying "demonstration area" -- a sarcastic jab at an earlier effort by Chinese authorities to restrict protests to a children's playground.

Beijing seemed to worry most about the topic of Tibet, as became clear at a workshop devoted to the subject.

A group of Tibetan women living in exile testified to human rights violations in Tibet, such as forced abortions and radioactive pollution from China's nuclear program. But before the group had finished its testimony, a Tibetan from an officially sanctioned delegation interrupted. The meeting degenerated into a free-for-all until the exiled Tibetans left in tears.

The chilling effects of this clash became obvious at a second, later, seminar about Tibet.

A Tibetan woman from the officially sanctioned delegation was told by her leaders to rewrite her speech, turning an insightful series of profiles on Tibetan women into a list of statistics extolling China's accomplishments.

"It could have really started a dialogue between women, but instead it ended up turning more people off to the Chinese position," said a participant in the second workshop. "That was a real disappointment."