SAN FRANCISCO - The Olympic flame arrived here Tuesday under heavy security as games officials dismissed suggestions that the global relay could be abandoned amid protests over China's human rights record.The symbolic flame arrived at San Francisco International Airport around 4:00 am (1100 GMT) for its only US stop, one day after the Olympic torch was snuffed out by officials five times in Paris.

Police guarded every entrance to the airport's international terminal and officers in riot gear patrolled outside the building, before the flame was whisked to a secret location ahead of Wednesday's torch relay.

A myriad of rights groups are planning to demonstrate in San Francisco and the city got an early taste of the protests on Monday when three activists scaled the Golden Gate Bridge and unfurled huge pro-Tibet banners.

In Beijing on Tuesday, Olympic chief Jacques Rogge raised the prospect of a possible abandonment of the relay's ensuing legs after confirming that the flame's odyssey would be reviewed at a meeting later this week.

However, he later moved to dampen speculation of the relay being stopped in an interview with France 3 television.

"It's a false rumour," Rogge said. "There is no discussion underway on the matter and we do not envisage such a scenario.

"We will of course analyze the route of the torch since the beginning, from Olympia to Paris although the next stage is San Francisco. That's what we are doing and we will make regular evaluations."

However, Rogge emphasized: "We are not in the dynamic of stopping."

Pro-Tibet campaigners have shadowed the flame from the moment it was lit in Greece on March 24, as demonstrators accuse China of violating human rights and protest a crackdown in Tibet that they say has left 150 people dead. China says "rioters" killed 20 people.

International leaders have also come under pressure to boycott the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Beijing on August 8.

US President George W. Bush was challenged on Monday by Senator Hillary Clinton to skip the ceremony, although the US leader has consistently said he plans to attend, arguing that the Olympics is about sport not politics.

However the White House on Tuesday did not rule out the possibility of Bush missing the event.

Asked by reporters if Bush would attend the opening ceremony, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said: "We haven't provided any schedule on the president's trip."

On Monday, the torch relay was dramatically cut short in Paris due to protests by hundreds of campaigners which forced officials to douse the torch five times.

Protesters also disrupted the previous day's leg in London, while activists have promised more of the same in San Francisco on Wednesday and later on in Australia, India, Thailand and Japan.

Rights groups planning protests in San Francisco on Wednesday stressed they were planning "peaceful, non-violent" demonstrations.

The Save Darfur Coalition, which is lobbying China to exert more pressure on Sudan's leaders to end violence in the country, categorically ruled out any attempt to disrupt the San Francisco relay.

"I can tell you absolutely unequivocally that we have no plans to interrupt or disrupt the torch relay," coalition spokesman Allyn Brooks LaSure told AFP.

Nyunt Than, president of the Burmese American Democratic Alliance, said the group was planning "non-violent direct action."

"That means civil disobedience. We might be sitting across the street but that is not violent," Than said.

Chinese officials have reacted strongly to the idea of stifling their effort to stage the most ambitious Olympic torch relay ever, visiting 19 countries plus China over a 137,000 kilometer (85,000 mile) journey.

"The disruption and sabotage of the torch relay is a challenge to the spirit of the Olympic charter, the world laws, and peace-loving people around the world," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said.