The Chinese foreign ministry however stressed bilateral ties would not be damaged and acknowledged British police had taken action over the incident that occurred as Wen gave a speech at Cambridge University on Monday.

"The Chinese side has expressed its strong dissatisfaction about the incident," ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said in a statement.

"(But) facts show the troublemaker who conducted this mean act is not accepted by the public and he will not stop the trend of a developing friendly relationship between China and Britain."

At a press conference later on Tuesday, Jiang referred to her earlier statement, then branded the protest as "despicable".

The government appeared to want to play down the incident domestically, with the state-run press mostly either censoring or ignoring the incident and Internet discussion about it restricted to a few pro-China comments.

In a clear echo of the Iraqi journalist throwing a shoe at George W. Bush in Baghdad in December, the 27-year-old man in Cambridge shouted: "This is a scandal" as he interrupted Wen's speech from the back of the auditorium.

"This dictator here, how can you listen to the lies he's telling? You are not challenging him," he said before blowing a whistle and hurling a sports shoe at Wen, who had been discussing China's role in the globalised world.

The trainer landed about a metre away from Wen, who dodged sharply to one side to watch it hit the stage but did not appear frightened and kept his composure.

As the protester was bundled out, he shouted to audience members: "Stand up and protest", to which some of the spectators -- most of whom appeared to be Chinese students -- retorted: "Shame on you, shame on you."

After the interruption, Wen reproached the demonstrator.

"This despicable behaviour cannot stand in the way of friendship between China and the UK," he said, receiving a round of applause from the audience.

British police later said they had charged the man with a public order offence.

Chinese media made scant mention of the shoe-throwing incident, with the official Xinhua news agency saying only that a "disturbance" during the speech had led to a reaction from the nation's foreign ministry but neglecting to elaborate on the nature of the "disturbance".

Other official media, such as the People's Daily newspaper, ignored the incident altogether when reporting on Wen's speech.

China's main television station, CCTV, which broadcast the speech live, abruptly cut away from the coverage during the protest.

It ran a brief report about the incident on the evening news Tuesday, showing footage of Wen and of the demonstrator being removed, but highlighting the "success" of the premier's visit to Britain.

There was only a little more discussion about the protest within China's Internet community, which is also subject to government censorship.

Comments on Internet blogs expressed strong support for Wen, a politician who is liked in China due to his populist touch, but it was impossible to tell if censors deleted dissenting views, as regularly happens on other issues.

"Our great premier," said one netizen on popular news web portal sohu.com.

"We have confidence in going through the global economic crisis under the premier's leadership. We have determination and a minority of people doing despicable acts cannot stop us."

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