Critics question China’s right to host Winter Olympics – POLITICO

Critics of China’s human rights record have a new sanction in mind for Beijing: to strip the city of the 2022 Winter Olympics.

Lawmakers in a number of major Olympic countries, including the Netherlands, Canada and the United States, recently said the 2022 Games should be withdrawn from China due to the crackdown on its Uyghur Muslim minority in the northwestern region of Xinjiang. The Dutch and Canadian parliaments officially called the crackdown “genocide”, as did the US State Department.

In an interview, Sjoerd Sjoerdsma, a Dutch MP from the ruling coalition D66 party, highlighted “the largest ethnic minority detention since World War II” and highlighted stories of forced sterilization and rape as proof that China should be stripped of the Olympics. .

Sjoerdsma, whose Social Liberal Party launched the Dutch motion to label the treatment of the Uyghur minority as genocide, said the athletes should decide for themselves whether to go to Beijing, but he would prefer the International Olympic Committee (IOC ), which organizes the games, assigned the event to another country.

“Large sports organizations, whether it be the Olympics or football, should take a much more in-depth look at the human rights situation in a possible host country, and whether it is already allocated … see how the situation is changing, ”he said.

In early February, a group of seven Republican US senators, including Rick Scott of Florida, all called for moving the Games to Beijing. In mid-February, Canadian Conservative Opposition Leader Erin O’Toole made a similar request.

This is not the first time that the location of the upcoming Olympic Games has sparked debate. Before the 1936 Games in Nazi Germany, teams from a number of countries, including the United States, considered staying away. In 1980, the US team boycotted the Moscow Olympics after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.

The effect of the seething resistance on Beijing as the 2022 host remains to be seen. Protests also erupted ahead of the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics over China’s Tibet policy, observers note, but the event went as planned.

Ties Dams, a Chinese researcher at the Clingendael Institute, a Dutch think tank, said the idea of ​​pressuring the Chinese government to change its treatment of the Uyghur minority by threatening to boycott the Olympics was unlikely. and “naive”.

However, he said the motion by the Dutch parliament to qualify the treatment of the Uyghur people as genocide could at least force the new government, which will be elected on March 17, to choose sides and support the hawkish stance on China taken by the administration of US President Joe Biden or the more cooperative approach taken by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron.

Take the European lead?

The Netherlands, a traditional powerhouse of the Winter Olympics thanks to its dominance in speed skating events, has recently emerged as a proponent of using sporting events to hold host countries to account for their policies. in human rights.

Dutch lawmakers last month passed a motion calling on the King and the Dutch Prime Minister not to attend the FIFA World Cup in Qatar if the Netherlands qualify for next year’s tournament, citing ” appalling conditions ”for the migrant workers who build the stadiums.

A similar motion for the Olympics was rejected, but lawmaker Sjoerdsma said he hoped it could still pass in the coming weeks, with some parties likely to change positions.

However, the Netherlands Olympic Committee has issued a warning as to how far the country may be prepared to go. Responding to questions about a possible Dutch boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics, a spokesperson for the committee said: “In the Netherlands we have the policy that a sports boycott is only mentioned if the countries -Bas as a country participate in a larger international. boycott involving several sectors. This is not the case.”

Canadian Olympic bosses, ahead of the national parliament’s declaration of genocide, also said they would not support a boycott.

In an opinion piece from early February – which remains their position – the heads of Canada’s Olympic and Paralympic committees wrote that sports boycotts were “nothing more than a practical and politically inexpensive alternative to real diplomacy and significant ”.

Chinese repression

China, which was angry with the pro-Tibet protests ahead of the 2008 Games, has made it clear that it takes any threat of a 2022 boycott very seriously.

“It is very irresponsible of anyone to attempt to interfere with, hinder or disrupt the organization and functioning of the [Winter] Olympic Games, for political reasons, ”Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said last month, responding to calls for an international boycott.

“We believe that such initiatives would not be supported by the international community and are doomed to failure,” Wang added.

Shortly after, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell that the two sides should “seize the opportunity of the Beijing Winter Olympics of the next year to strengthen exchanges on winter sports “and” promote new highlights “in bilateral cooperation.

In the same appeal, Wang also said that China “opposes the fabrication and dissemination of lies and false information” about Xinjiang and Hong Kong.

For its part, the IOC has tried to stay away from politics, telling POLITICO that it remains “neutral” on all global political issues.

“Attributing the Olympic Games to a National Olympic Committee (NOC) does not mean that the IOC agrees with the political structure, social circumstances or human rights standards in its country,” he said. declared.

It is a position that has drawn its own criticism. Jules Boykoff, a professor at the University of the Pacific who has written extensively on the Olympics, accused the IOC of “hypocrisy”.

“The IOC has shown an unfortunate propensity to turn away from atrocities against human rights in order to ensure that the games continue,” Boykoff said.

“The Olympic Charter is full of powerful ideas on equality and the fight against discrimination, but the IOC ignores its own charter when it suits it to do so,” he said.

But what effect do geopolitical maneuvers have on the real stars of any Olympic?

Olympic competitors have been placed in a difficult position, said Rob Koehler of Global Athlete, an athlete-led sports movement.

“As governments call for a boycott of the Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Games, once again, athletes are being used as pawns,” Koehler said. “The IOC and the IPC are primarily responsible for placing the athletes in this position.”

“It was the IOC and the IPC that decided to award the games to a country with an appalling human rights record,” he said.

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