John Stillwell / Pool via Getty Images

Queen Elizabeth II poses for a group photo with her royal guests at Windsor Castle.

LONDON -- A lunch of monarchs, hosted by Britain's Queen Elizabeth II on Friday as part of her Diamond Jubilee celebrations, has attracted protests from campaigners angry at the attendance of the king of Bahrain and the king of Swaziland.

The king of Bahrain, whose regime is accused of brutally suppressing pro-democracy demonstrations, was among dozens of sovereign monarchs invited to the banquet at Windsor Castle.

On Wednesday, protesters gathered outside the recently-refurbished Savoy hotel -- where Swaziland’s King Mswati III is believed to be staying. With more than a dozen wives and an entourage of 30, Africa’s last monarch lives in luxury despite the abject poverty of his subjects. Pictures of the protest were posted on a campaign blog.

Meanwhile, demonstrators were expected to stage protests outside Bahrain's embassy in London later on Friday.

The former Foreign Office minister Denis MacShane accused his old department of placing the Queen in an impossible position. The Labour party lawmaker told The Guardian newspaper: “Many in Britain will regret that the foreign secretary, who approves all invitations sent in the queen's name as head of state, has decided to include a representative of the Bahraini regime which has done such terrible things to its own people since the Arab awakening a year ago."

Read more on this story from Britain's ITV News

However, pro-Bahrain monarchy supporter Lubna Sulaipeekh told ITV News that King Hamad of Bahrain's attendance at the Queen's Jubilee lunch is "appropriate" as Britain and Bahrain have "always had good relations".

Among those not attending is Queen Sofía of Spain, whose government turned down the invitation in a diplomatic spat over Gibraltar, the U.K. overseas territory Spain wants returned.

Graham Smith, from British anti-monarchy campaign group, Republic, told the London Evening Standard: “The queen cannot hide behind protocol and precedent — this is a crisis of her own making. The British people strongly support the struggle for democracy in the Middle East and around the world — this is a catastrophic error of judgment."

Responding to criticism, a Foreign Office spokesman said that maintaining a close relationship with Bahrain allowed it to "have a full and frank discussion on a range of issues".

He told ITV News:  "On human rights we support the reforms already under way in Bahrain and we want to help promote that reform. We have consistently encouraged the Bahraini government to take further urgent steps to implement in full the recommendations of the Independent Commission of Inquiry as the his majesty the king has committed to doing. This includes bringing to account those individuals responsible for human rights abuses."

Slideshow: Fit for a queen: 60 years of style

Getty Images

From unique prints to fabulous hats, the British monarch's fashion choices often show a sense of fun. Take a look through Queen Elizabeth II's signature looks over the years.

Launch slideshow

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Oli Scarff / Getty Images, file

A woman looks through donated books which are available for free loan outside Kensal Rise library in London, England.

LONDON -- A British library opened more than a century ago by one of America’s greatest writers is being closed because of austerity budget cuts.

Kensal Rise public library, in north-west London, was unveiled in 1900 by Mark Twain while he was living in the city.

He donated five of his own works to its initial collection, which had been established in celebration of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee.

But 112 years later -- and days away from the Diamond Jubilee of Victoria's granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II -- the library is facing its end as part of spending cuts by the local council.

Oli Scarff / Getty Images, file

Protest posters on Kensal Rise library in London, England.

It has been locked up and unused for more than a year. Workers for Brent Council attempted to clear out the remaining books on Wednesday but were met with resistance from local campaigners.

Since the closure was announced, a group of activists has called for it to be saved, enlisting modern British literary figures such as Alan Bennett to their cause.

For the activists, the library is a piece of history worth holding on to but the council says the number of users is too low to justify keeping it open.

It is one of six libraries closed in the area, representing a 50 percent cut in services. The council says it has used some of the savings to support a remaining library within a civic center that is more popular.

The building was donated to the community by Oxford University’s All Souls College through an Act of Parliament. Under that law, the facility can only be used by the council as a free library. The library’s closure means ownership will pass automatically back to the college.

A spokesman for All Souls told msnbc.com: "This is not something we engineered, this is not something we ever contemplated happening and we regret what is happening."

Campaigner Margaret Bailey expressed anger at the closure and pledged to continue the fight, praising "the support of the local community."

The protesters have set up a small free-loan library outside to distribute books to the community.

Bailey hopes to present a proposal to the college to establish a private volunteer-run library at the site.

The council has suspended its closure plans the removal of books in order to consult further with the campaigners. But for now the books will stay in their boxes and the library will remain closed.

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The world's most expensive cable car is undergoing tests in London – but authorities admit the project, which links two Olympic venues, may not open in time for this summer's Games.

The 1,000-yard gondola lift line crosses the River Thames in east London and is planned to be both a commuter route and a tourist attraction.

It has been enthusiastically backed by London Mayor Boris Johnson, but opponents point out the scheme will use public money despite a huge $57 million sponsorship deal with Dubai-based Emirates Airlines which means the facility will be officially known as the Emirates Air Line.

PhotoBlog: London's new Thames cable car in place - but will it be ready for the Olympics?

It will cost up to $95 million in total, with around $20 million coming from local public funds.

Transit authority Transport for London (TfL), which will operate the cable car, will only say the project will be open "in the summer," raising the prospect that it will not be ready in time for the London 2012 Games in July. TfL insists the route was never part of the Olympic transport plan.

Two 300ft-high pillars will carry more than 30 gondolas across the river from the O2 – the Greenwich concert venue that will host events including the gymnastics and basketball finals – to the Docklands-based ExCel conference center which is being used for boxing, fencing, judo, taekwondo, table tennis, weightlifting and wrestling.

The cost of a journey on the Emirates Air Line has not yet been set, but TfL says it will be similar to the frequent Thames River Boat service whose fares are around $8. Passengers will be able to pay with Oyster cards, the pre-payment "smart card" used by millions of Londoners.

Slideshow: When the Olympics is your neighbor

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A diverse community in East London will welcome the world to Britain for the 2012 Olympic Games. Meet residents and hear how they feel about having a huge, world stage in their backyard.

Launch slideshow

Although the cost will be significantly higher than the equivalent bus or subway journey, the views from the 10-person gondolas traveling 160 feet above the ground are undoubtedly more appealing. 

TfL says the system will move 2,000 passengers an hour -- the equivalent capacity of more than 30 buses.

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Ian Johnston, msnbc.com

Nick Letchford, co-founder of Jaguar Shoes, outside the bar in Kingsland Road, east London.

SHOREDITCH, London – A British arts "collective" visited by stars like Natalie Portman, Amy Winehouse and Beyonce is locked in a legal battle over its name with automaker Jaguar.

Jaguar Shoes -- a cafe, bar and art gallery -- opened in London’s Shoreditch in 2001 at the start of the transformation of the area from a run-down district to a hub of artistic activity that's become a favorite haunt of the city’s “hipsters.”

Founders Nick and Teresa Letchford, who are brother and sister, created the venue by knocking together a former bag store and a former shoe store. Partly due to a lack of money, they decided to keep the storefront signs, and the quirkily titled “Dream Bags Jaguar Shoes” was born.

Because the Jaguar Shoes sign was over the main door, that became the name they were known by, the name of the collective of artists who show their work there and the name of their website.

Portman partied, Beyonce borrowed office
But when they sought to protect “Jaguar Shoes” with a trademark –- a move Nick Letchford said was a response to their work being copied -- car company Jaguar Land Rover submitted an objection that might ultimately make it impossible or impractical to use the name.

The gallery has promoted more than 600 artists, musicians and fashion designers and has been featured in ads for the likes of sneaker firm Adidas.

It was name-checked in the song “You Want History” by British band Kaiser Chiefs. Actress Natalie Portman once danced to the music of Animal Collective in the basement, and Beyonce borrowed their office to do a webcast.

“In Shoreditch, that sort of thing doesn’t come as a massive surprise,” Letchford told msnbc.com in an interview at Jaguar Shoes, because it is “completely full of creative-industry types.”

A former assistant film director who worked with Madonna's ex-husband and filmmaker Guy Ritchie, among others, Letchford said when they adopted the shoe store’s name, “it never crossed our mind” that there might be a problem.

“This has been going on for about two years. We’ve tried to settle it, we’re looking to settle, but it feels like we’re banging our heads against a brick wall,” he said.

“Conceptually, Jaguar Shoes is a very different thing to a Jaguar [car]. If I think what jaguar shoes are, what they represent … most people are going to see a pair of catskin shoes,” he added. “I think it’s basically a default objection to any other use of jaguar, the word.”

Asked if losing the case would mean they would not be able to use the name, Letchford said, “I don’t really want to contemplate that.”

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A hearing at the U.K.’s Intellectual Property Office is due to be heard in the coming weeks.

Catherine Wolfe, president of The Institute of Trade Mark Attorneys, told msnbc.com that the “basic test” was whether people were “confused” and thought Jaguar Shoes had something to do with the car company.

“Are you more likely to go to that bar because it’s got the name of a cool car?” she wondered.

Gandalf saved 'The Hobbit'
U.K. law also says a trademark will not be registered if it takes “unfair advantage” of or is “detrimental” to an earlier trademark.

In a recent, separate case, a bar in Southampton, England, called The Hobbit was threatened with legal action for copyright infringement by California-based Saul Zaentz Co., which owns worldwide rights to a number of brands associated with author J.R.R. Tolkien.

Attempts made to trademark 'Occupy' slogans

After public outcry, a deal was reached that saw Gandalf actor Sir Ian McKellen help pay a copyright license fee to enable the bar to carry on using the name.

Letchford clearly hopes publicity will persuade Jaguar Land Rover to drop its "irrational and inappropriate pressure," as he said in a press release on Jaguar Shoes' website.

A petition has been set up asking people to sign if they have “never experienced any confusion between the restaurant bar and gallery brand JAGUAR SHOES and JAGUAR who make cars,” and wish to ask the trademark authority to allow Jaguar Shoes to trademark its name.

As of Tuesday morning, the petition had 859 signatures. News of the legal fight has also been spreading on Twitter. Letchford said he thought it likely that most people in London’s creative industries had heard about their case. 

Letchford said Jaguar’s attempt to protect its brand seemed to have achieved “completely the opposite.”

“People have just been like ‘Is this for real?’ It doesn’t feel like it’s for real,” Letchford said.

“I’ve been stressed out about it for two years, and now it’s about to come to a head. It’s a point of principle. really.… The sign is what started the business. That’s the genesis of Jaguar Shoes, that’s the authenticity.” 

Jaguar Land Rover, owned by Indian car giant Tata Motors, did not return a call from msnbc.com asking for comment.

While public records show that Jaguar Land Rover has objected, they do not reveal the grounds for the objection. Letchford said there had been negotiations with Jaguar Land Rover but added that he had been advised not to go into detail.

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LONDON - Police in Britain released video footage of an apparent road-rage incident between an angry woman and a man on a bicycle on a country lane, ITV News reported Monday.

The clip shows a man wearing Wellington boots and flat-cap cycling along the narrow road when he is approached by a woman on foot, who appears to throw punches and kicks.

Police have issued the video, which was shot by someone in a car following the pair and posted on YouTube, as part of an appeal for witnesses of the January 28 incident in the western England county of Gloucestershire.

Some reports on Monday suggested there could be more to the altercation than meets the eye.

ITV News said longer versions of the clip include allegations that the cyclist was deliberately blocking traffic because he was a supporter of fox-hunting and wanted to stop anti-hunt campaigners reaching their destination.

Fox-hunting – a British country pursuit which involves tracking, chasing and killing foxes - was outlawed in 2005. But hunting by a smell or trail is still lawful and monitored by anti-hunt campaigners, according to the Daily Telegraph.

Police have appealed for the pair captured on the film to come forward.

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The Times

The front page of Wednesday's Times newspaper in London.

LONDON - The organized sexual exploitation of girls as young as 13, for which nine men were jailed in Britain Wednesday, is abuse in the most pernicious form imaginable. 

Last year I spent six months investigating this crime for British television on Channel 4's investigative news show, Dispatches. It was one of the most grueling stories I have worked on in my 17 years as a journalist.

I met victims, their families, police investigators and people who helped the victims piece together their broken lives – as well as men with an inside knowledge about the underworld of ‘on-street grooming’.

I spent time in some of the areas where these crimes took place and listened in great detail to the nature of the crime and the impact it had on the young victims.

I was haunted by what I learned. During my time off or away from the story, I had vicious nightmares. Graphic accounts of rape and sexual abuse are not easy to put out of mind when heard in detail, especially not when the victims are barely pubescent. The men I met, who spoke to me anonymously about the motivations of the gangs who carry out these crimes, told me things that disgusted and enraged me. That was the impact on me, a professionally dispassionate reporter long accustomed to remaining cool no matter what the story. Imagine the impact on someone at the heart of this terrible crime.

Investigating Britain's 'sex gangs'

The parents of the victims, whose destroyed lives were so obviously in pieces, were fighting feelings of guilt, sadness and anger. And the girls, who had faced rape and gang-rape at the hands of men much, much older than them, were some of the bravest I've ever met. I saw pictures of them before their ordeal; they could have been anyone's daughter, sister or niece. But the girls who sat before me were damaged, perhaps beyond repair, their innocence stolen.

What I now find more terrifying than the crime is the sheer scale of it: case after case is turning up in British courts. What we know about it is still emerging, and those who work with the girls say organized sex abuse is at least a generation old.  That, too, makes me shudder: There are victims who never received the help they needed or the justice they should have had.

Newspaper front pages on Wednesday showed the faces of the men who will now spend years in prison, but behind other closed doors there are girls whose lives were brutally stolen from them and whose future will always be marked by the horrors they faced in their childhood.

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LONDON -- An American self-defense expert -- who teaches people how to deal with "kill-or-be-killed" situations -- has been banned from entering Britain. Officials say Tim Larkin's presence "was not conducive to the public good."

Larkin attempted to board a flight to the U.K. from Las Vegas, but was given a letter from the U.K. Border Agency saying he would not be allowed in, according to BBC News.

"The home secretary [the U.K. government's interior minister] will seek to exclude an individual if she considers that his or her presence in the U.K. is not conducive to the public good," a government spokesperson told the BBC, confirming Larkin was subject to an exclusion order.

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Larkin, who runs a company called Target Focus Training, previously came to the U.K. in 2009, when he taught a class to teach people how to "maim and kill in self-defense," the BBC reported.

Trains Navy SEALs
According to his firm's website, Larkin is "the guy operations like the US Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces and the U.S. Border Patrol call in behind-the-scenes to teach them when it’s 'kill-or-be-killed.' The truth is … your best self defense in a life-or-death confrontation is injuring the other guy. And it’s the one thing that makes us so different."

Larkin has spoken to government officials and business people in more 40 countries about surviving life-or-death violence, according to the website. He also co-authored a book called How To Survive The Most Critical 5 Seconds Of Your Life and writes an online newsletter, Secrets For Staying Alive When Rules Don’t Apply.

The U.K.'s Guardian newspaper ran an online poll about the decision to prevent Larkin from coming to Britain. At 10:15 a.m. ET, more than 72 percent of those choosing to vote said he should have not have been banned.

The BBC said Larkin had been invited to speak at "The Martial Arts Show" conference in Birmingham on May 12 and 13, and to hold a seminar in the Tottenham area of London. Both places experienced rioting during widespread disorder in the U.K. in August last year.

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Larkin told the BBC that he thought he had been banned for arguing that U.K. law should be changed to allow people to defend themselves without fear of criminal charges being brought against them.

"You are sitting in your house and you're being attacked, or you're attacked out in the street... There's an awful lot of martial arts and self-defense being taught there right now that gives no instruction on [how to hurt] the human body," he said.

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"There are those rare, rare black swan occasions -- like the [August] riots -- where law-abiding citizens are put in situations where they are facing grievous bodily harm and they hesitate because they are afraid of being prosecuted. That is a very real thing," he added.

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Greater Manchester Police

Eight of the nine men convicted Tuesday as part Greater Manchester Police's investigation into child sexual exploitation are seen here. Clockwise from top left: Abdul Aziz, Abdul Qayyum, Adil Khan, Hamid Safi, Abdul Rauf, Mohammed Sajid, Mohammed Amin and Kabeer Hassan.

LONDON -- Nine men were jailed on Wednesday for grooming and sexually exploiting girls aged as young as 13 in the north of England.

Five victims were "shared" by Kabeer Hassan, Abdul Aziz, Abdul Rauf, Mohammed Sajid, Adil Khan, Abdul Qayyum, Mohammed Amin, Hamid Safi and a 59-year-old man who cannot be named for legal reasons, The Guardian reported. 

The Times

The front page of Wednesday's Times newspaper, in London.

The men were aged between 24 and 59, all but one were of Pakistani heritage. The other was from Afghanistan. They were found guilty of conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with a child, the BBC News reported. Other convictions included rape, sexual assault and sexual activity with a child.

They were given sentences ranging from four to 19 years, the BBC reported.

Jurors were told that the men gave the victims alcohol and drugs and then would "pass them around" for sex, according to the BBC. Some of the victims were forced to have sex with "several men in a day, several times a week," the jury heard.

NBC News Correspondent Tazeen Ahmad: Investigating Britain's 'sex gangs'

The gang preyed on girls -- all of whom were white -- from "chaotic" backgrounds, the BBC quoted the police as saying. 

The men, who live in the run-down industrial towns of Rochdale and Oldham, were found guilty on Tuesday. Two others were acquitted after the 11-month trial. 

50 members of grooming gang?
It emerged after the conviction that police believed the grooming gang had 50 members, the Manchester Evening News reported.

Sentencing the men, Judge Gerald Clifton said they treated the girls "as though they were worthless and beyond respect," the BBC reported.

"One of the factors leading to that was the fact that they were not part of your community or religion," he added. "Some of you, when arrested, said it (the prosecution) was triggered by race. That is nonsense. What triggered this prosecution was your lust and greed."

Police and social workers have been accused of initially not acting on allegations raised in 2008 for fear of appearing racist.

"This is an absolute scandal. They were petrified of being called racist and so reverted to the default of political correctness," former member of parliament Ann Cryer told The Daily Telegraph.  "They had a greater fear of being perceived in that light than in dealing with the issues in front of them."

The tabloid Daily Mail newspaper ran the front-page headline: "Why did no one listen to teenage victims of sex gang?"

Cop: 'Not a racial issue'
However, a senior police officer involved in the investigation rejected calls for the case to be seen through the prism of race. 

"It is not a racial issue. This is about adults preying on vulnerable young children," the Telegraph quoted Assistant Chief Constable Steve Heywood of Greater Manchester Police as saying. "It just happens that in this particular area and time the demographics were that these were Asian men."

"I am currently running several other inquiries about on-street grooming and it is not Asian men," BBC News quoted Heywood as saying.

Nevertheless, the case was seized on by the head of the far-right British National Party (BNP), raising the specter of an extremist backlash.

The leader of the BNP, Nick Griffin, tweeted before the jury had announced its decision that seven verdicts had been reached. It is not clear how he learned of the jury's decision given that strict reporting restrictions were in place. 

The case has already sparked protests by far-right groups. Greater Manchester Police said on Wednesday they were preparing for possible racially motivated violence. 

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courtesy Hawkins family

Former British Royal Marine Ed Hawkins was seriously injured in Afghanistan in 2010. He left hospital last year and is currently on a work placement.

LONDON -- Fisher House, the Maryland-based charity which provides overnight accommodation for families visiting hospitalized military members, is expanding onto foreign soil for the first time with a facility for British troops.

Construction has begun on a $6.8-million building with 18 en-suite rooms that will allow relatives to stay close to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, where the U.K.'s most seriously wounded military personnel are treated.

As well as providing servicemen and women a place to relax away from hospital wards, it will have communal living space including a family room, play area, lounge and kitchen and a private garden.

Fisher House, which was founded during the first Gulf War in 1990, has more than 50 projects in the U.S., as well as others located on American bases in Germany. However, this is its first truly international venture.

'Unique American model'
Talk show host and former U.S. Marine Montel Williams and the charity’s chairman, Ken Fisher, attended a ground-breaking ceremony at the site.

Courtesy Fisher House

Montel Williams at the ground-breaking ceremony for the new Fisher House project at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, England, on April 23.

"This is a great honor for Fisher House, as we share with our British brothers and sisters our unique American model for caring for military families," Fisher said.

"This will be a sanctuary for the people who need it most: those who have made deep personal sacrifices – whether on the battlefield or on the home front – to keep us safe.  We thank them even though we know it will never be enough."

Almost 10,000 British troops are in combat alongside 90,000 U.S. personnel in Afghanistan. Figures from Britain's Ministry of Defence, collated by The Guardian newspaper, show 832 have been seriously wounded since Operation Enduring Freedom began in 2001.

Many families travel for hundreds of miles to be by their loved ones' bedside -- sometimes for weeks at a time, because of the need for months or even years of surgery and rehabilitation. Military accommodation exists for family members but only six bedrooms are available at Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Sue Hawkins, whose son Ed was almost killed by an improvised explosive device while on a patrol in Afghanistan in May 2010, said the new facility would "be a great source of comfort, particularly at a time when families are surrounded by so much uncertainty."

The blast killed his corporal and seriously wounded Ed, who was serving with the Royal Marines. He was flown back to Birmingham for several months of treatment.

"When we were told about Ed, we just left for the hospital," Sue Hawkins told msnbc.com. "We had no idea how long we would be there or even if he would survive. I can remember everything about that day, because of the shock, but that last thing you have time to think about it is planning where to stay."

Five-hour round trip
Faced with a daily five-hour round trip from their home in Hampshire, Sue and her husband Michael spent many nights across the road from the hospital in a former nurses' accommodation block, before moving to the military facility – a converted house in a residential street.

"There were times when Ed became very distressed and we were able to reach him quickly when the hospital called," she said. "That sort of comfort and care is very important. We know first-hand how important it is to have a 'home from home' in difficult, emotional and challenging times. Fisher House truly is a massive step in the best direction possible.”

Ed Hawkins, who is now 26, left hospital last year and is currently on a work placement.

British soldier Nick Gibbons, who lost a leg in a bomb in Afghanistan in 2008, also attended the ground-breaking ceremony on April 23. He told ITV News: "It's what you need really, your family around you. Facilities like this are great because it not only allows the family to stay here, it gives you a better relationship with your family. It's a stressful time. The last thing you want is them travelling."

Fisher House has contributed $2 million to the project, with the rest of the building cost provided by U.K. veterans' charity Help for Heroes, whose high-profile supporters include Prince Harry. It will be operated by the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Charity and funded by Help for Heroes when it opens next year.

President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle have previously made a sizeable donation to Fisher House, which also operates a Hero Miles Program that uses donated frequent flyer miles to bring family members to the bedside of injured service members. 

Montel Williams told the Birmingham Mail that he was a regular visitor to Fisher House sites in the U.S., cooking meals for soldiers and their families. "I'll definitely be coming to Birmingham to do the same," he told the newspaper. "I'll bring my sister and my chef with me and we'll rustle up things like crab cakes and fish. It'll be real American-style cooking."

Msnbc.com's David Arnott contributed to this report.

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Argentina's Olympic Committee is distancing itself from a television ad that has sparked a dispute with Britain ahead of the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London.

Britain demanded an apology from Argentina over the controversial 90-second ad, aired on Argentine television last week, showing an athlete training in the Falkland Islands, the British territory in the south Atlantic to which Buenos Aires lays claim.

Set to stirring music, the ad shows Argentine field hockey captain Fernando Zylberberg training for the games by running through the islands' capital of Stanley, passing by British symbols such as a red telephone booth. When Zylberberg reaches the memorial to British sailors who died in the war, he is seen doing step-ups on it. 

The ad concludes with the provocative slogan, "To compete on English soil, we train on Argentine soil."

“Desecrating a war memorial, using it as a cheap prop in a very tawdry little advert, I think that just says so much about the way that [Argentine President Cristina] Fernández de Kirchner is conducting her business,” Falklands War veteran Simon Weston told ITN.

The ad was made and released by the Argentine government, led by President Fernández de Kirchner, who is attempting to rally international opinion behind her country's claim to the islands.

London has controlled the islands since 1833. Argentina has long claimed the territory, saying it inherited it from Spain on independence and that Britain expelled an Argentine population from the islands.

UK accuses Argentina of 'harassment', 'threats' over Falkland Islands

Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague told ITN Argentina was misusing the Olympics for political gain.

“I think they are now resorting to one or two stunts, I don’t think they will win any support for that," Hague said. "Any attempt to misuse the Olympic Games for political purposes isn’t going to go down well anywhere in the world.”

The Falkland Islands sports council told ITN it planned to complain about the ad to the International Olympic Committee.

"It’s caused a lot of reaction here because of the athlete doing step-ups on the war memorial, and that pretty disrespectful,” Mike Summers, chair of Falklands Nation Sports Council told ITN.

The IOC later sent a letter to Argentina's national Olympic committee denouncing the ad.

The Argentine national Olympic committee responded in a statement released on Tuesday: "The Argentine National Olympic Committee is fully committed to the Olympic charter and the best practices of the Olympic movement. We strongly believe the Olympic Games are not a platform for politics and we have communicated this position to the International Olympic Committee."

ITN and Reuters contributed to this report.

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Paul Hackett / Reuters

Spectators find their seats at the official opening of the London Olympics stadium, inside the Olympic park, London, Saturday.

Britain has begun an inquiry into security at the London Olympics after a worker reportedly smuggled a fake bomb onto the site to expose flaws in its anti-terror defenses.

The worker carried the artificial bomb through two checkpoints without being searched by security staff, according to a British tabloid newspaper report.

Once inside, he was able to drive the package through the site, taking it past the velodrome before posing for a photograph with it outside the Olympic Stadium, The Sun reported.

The stunt, 24 hours before 40,000 people attended the official opening of the stadium on Saturday, was designed to show how vulnerable the site, which also includes the athletes' village, could be to a terrorist attack.

Fears that the international spectacle could be targeted by extremists have led organisers to spend $1.6 billion (£1 billion) on security for the games including 23,700 guards, 14,000 troops at key times and an 11-mile electric fence.

A spokesman for Britain’s Home Office told The Telegraph it had asked games organizers to "look into this incident and report back to the Home Secretary urgently".

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