Silvio Berlusconi, Italy"s prime minister, has pledged "zero tolerance" of protests aimed at disrupting the Winter Olympics, which opened in Turin last night.

After a week in which Olympic torch-bearers ran the gauntlet of demonstrations along the route to the opening ceremony, Mr Berlusconi said Italy was in danger of appearing to be "the only country in the world that doesn"t want the games".

On Thursday, he said he was considering issuing a warning of "drastic measures" if protesters continued disruption. But after a cabinet meeting yesterday, in which he received a "reassuring" briefing from his interior minister, Giuseppe Pisanu, he adopted a more moderate tone, saying the authorities would pay "vigilant and careful attention" to what happened in and around Turin.

The games have become a focus for many grievances. They are being staged in a district where local people are at loggerheads with the government over plans to build a railway tunnel through the Alps. Other protests have targeted the role of Coca-Cola as chief Olympic sponsor and forced redundancies among Fiat workers.

On Thursday, the flame was passed on outside the Fiat works at Mirafiori to chants of "We want to go back in!" and "Our families are living on 700 [480] a month!" Protests along the torch"s route have drawn in anarchists, squatters and anti-globalisation protesters. Mr Berlusconi said on Thursday that anti-globalisation was a "subversive movement".

Oliviero Diliberto of the Italian Communists said: "The only person in Italy who is genuinely subversive and dangerous for democracy is Silvio Berlusconi." s to the extent to which he had or had not committed to the U.S. president the United Kingdom"s support, and that requires, at the very least, a full and thorough inquiry."