Shoe hurled at fund chief

ISTANBUL: A student journalist threw a shoe at IMF director Dominique Strauss-Kahn yesterday and ran toward the stage shouting "IMF get out" as the finance official answered questions at a university in Istanbul.

The white sports shoe bounced off another student's head but missed the IMF chief before landing beside him on the speaker's platform. Some students applauded. Strauss-Kahn moved to the side, and a security guard rushed to protect him.

Other guards quickly blocked the man - a student and a journalist with a small left-wing newspaper - from reaching the platform. They pushed him to the floor and dragged him from the hall.

A female protester also tried to unfurl a banner while shouting "IMF get out" but she was escorted out of the conference hall.

It was the latest copycat shoe protest imitating the shoe attack last year directed at former President George W.Bush by an Iraqi journalist in Baghdad.

- AAP