China is expected to use the 2008 Olympics to showcase itself as a modern and mature world power, but the event will also be used by Taiwan and its critics on human rights and *Tibet,* analysts say.

World opinion was divided when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) awarded Beijing the Games over Paris and Toronto in 2001 and the debate over that decision is expected to rage up to 2008.

As Athens handed the Olympic baton to Beijing Sunday, rights groups lined up to renew their campaigns to bring issues like the death penalty, *Tibet* and China's suppression of the Falungong spiritual group back into the spotlight.

Two foreign *Tibet* activists, an American and an Australian, briefly unveiled a banner in a Beijing park Monday reading "No Olympics for China until *Tibet* is Free" before being detained, in a sign of events to come.

And uncertainty over the future of Taiwan, an island off the southeast coast which split from China after a civil war in 1949, could also cloud the Games, analysts say.

"The people of China certainly deserve the Olympic Games. Regrettably, the Chinese government does not," said Harry Wu, a veteran Chinese dissident who toiled for 19 years in labour camps after speaking out for human rights.

"More important than constructing fancy stadiums in record time is to build a free society and to end repression," he said.

For Brad Adams, head of the Asia Division of US-based Human Rights Watch, the Games will provide an opportunity for the world to judge China on its record. "The world will be watching to see whether China is able to open up and allow its citizens basic freedoms.

"Otherwise, the Games could well showcase repression in China instead of progress," he said.

Few however believe that hosting the Olympics will usher in any serious political reform in China, where the Community Party has remained in power since 1949, although the IOC is convinced it is a step in the right direction.

The IOC's Beijing co-ordination vice-president Kevan Gosper said China had already started social and economic reforms and the Games would help that process. "They haven't needed the Olympic Games to open the country up - that process started in 1979-80 but it's the acceleration," he said.

Analysts though say the pace of China's reforms will be mainly determined by Chinas leaders calculation of risk to their political survival and to the stability of the country, rather than the Olympics.

"China is too big and too complex to be changed by an Olympic Games," said Wang Jianwei, a China expert at the University of Wisconsin.

"The process of preparing for the Games may change some of the regimes arbitrary practices at least for the time being. Having said that, I doubt the Games will have any dramatic impact on Chinas political reform."

Tensions with rival Taiwan could however pose a major challenge for the leadership in the run-up to the Olympics.

Beijing still regards Taiwan as an integral part of greater China and has for years threatened war if the island's government moves towards formal independence.

Taiwan's President Chen Shui-bian has ruled out any change to the status of Taiwan but has vowed to introduce constitutional reforms in 2008, which Beijing opposes.

Beijing has insisted that settling the Taiwan issue takes precedence over the Olympics. Analysts said China was less likely to take military action with such an event on its shores, but it could not be ruled out.

"This doesn't mean war is not going to happen," warned James Lilley, a former US ambassador to China.

Despite concerns that little will change politically in China, Lilley said the country would get it wanted from the Games -- to showcase itself on the international stage as a rising world power.

"This will put China on the map as a benign, mature, cleaned up power, taking care of its people, rapid development, good hotels, good food -- all these things they want to put out there," Lilley said.

Not only will that help the country reap more international investment and tourism revenue, boasting its already buoyant economy, but it could improve the regime's image, rather than tarnish it.