Protesters greet Olympic flame in London

LONDON, April 6 (UPI) -- Activists disrupted Sunday's Olympic torch relay in London, including a man who tried to grab the torch to protest China's human rights record, police said.

London police guarded the 31-mile route and escorted torchbearers as protesters of China's human rights record and its involvement in Tibet tried to extinguish the flame, CNN reported.

London police announced 15 arrests Sunday, but the relay passed by London's Chinese embassy and the office of Prime Minister Gordon Brown without incident.

Brown noted the Dalai Lama resisted calls to boycott the Beijing Summer Games and refused to make a gesture of opposition against China during the torch relay.

Liberal Democratic Party leader Nick Clegg called the torch procession "wholly inappropriate," saying "human rights are being systematically abused on an extraordinary scale in China," the BBC reported.

But the chairman of the organizing committee for the 2012 Summer Games in London, Sebastian Cole, hailed the Olympics as a venue to "bring disparate communities together."

About 80 celebrities, athletes and other public figures participated in the 31-mile relay from London's Wembley Stadium to the O2 Arena in Greenwich.