A senior International Olympic Committee (IOC) member said the turmoil that hounded Beijing’s global torch relay nearly turned the Games into a “disaster,” and that political boycotts were only averted due to the goodwill that followed the devastating Sichuan earthquake in May.
Canadian member Dick Pound said during the IOC’s general assembly yesterday that the international relay should never have taken place in light of expected protests by activists opposed to China’s policies on Tibet, human rights and other issues.
“This came very close to becoming a disaster,” he said. “The risks were obvious and should have been assessed a little more carefully. The result is there was a crisis affecting the Games.”
Earlier, IOC president Jacques Rogge said the committee would still consider whether to eliminate international relays in the future, but it was the outspoken Pound who raised the issue to a more contentious level.
“In my country and in many other countries in my part of the world, we were in full boycott mode,” he said. “Public opinion and political opinion was moving toward an actual boycott of the Games and it was only the earthquake tragedy that diverted attention from what could otherwise have been something very, very serious.”
Pound said the IOC should fully analyze the relay situation.
“It’s been done and resolved and we escaped this disaster,” he said, as leaders of the Beijing organizing committee listened from the dais.
Rogge said the IOC will always retain its tradition of lighting the Olympic flame in Ancient Olympia and starting the torch relay in Greece. But he reiterated the IOC might do away with future global relays and limit the flame processions to routes in host countries.
“We respect protests and freedom of expression, but violence is against the Olympic spirit,” Rogge said.
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