When Chinese Olympic officials said in a statement last week that politics doesn't belong on the sports field we were reminded of words spoken by International Olympic Committee (IOC) vice president Thomas Bach back in 2001: "All the members [of the IOC] are well aware that this election has a political significance and for all the members I have spoken to, human rights is an issue."
Bach thought at the time that the Olympics would have a positive influence on China's human rights record. But for a while it seemed the reverse was happening, as Olympic organizations in some Western countries seemed to be taking a page from China's totalitarian notebook.
The New Zealand Olympic Committee added a clause to athlete contracts a while ago banning them from making political statements or demonstrating while in Beijing -- whether protesting on their own or responding to questions from journalists. It reneged on that position yesterday, however, in a U-turn that opposition Green MP Keith Locke welcomed, saying it would give New Zealand athletes the right to speak freely about what they saw in China.
This development followed on the heels of the British Olympic Association backing down last week from plans to add their own clauses to athlete's contracts limiting free speech.
Olympic Charter Rule 51 forbids any kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda within any Olympic sites, venues or other areas. Protesting outside "designated areas," however, is allowed and this is what the UK and New Zealand Olympic committees were attempting to curb by forcing their athletes to sign the contracts. At stake is the fear that Olympians are going to use Beijing as a venue to criticize China over its human rights abuses in Darfur and Tibet, among a host of other issues.
But it wasn't only organizations that sought to muzzle athletes. Milan Zver, sports minister for Slovenia, told athletes not to raise human rights and other sensitive political issues during the Olympics because "sports are too important to use as a political instrument."
This is really no different than doing business in China: Make any kind of investment you want, but don't discuss any political issues while doing so. In this sense, the Olympics are business as usual.
Jonathan Edwards and Matthew Pinsent, two respected British Olympic champions, said they supported the right of athletes to condemn China's record on human rights and foreign policy. American gold medalist Joey Cheek agrees. Last week the Team Darfur member said that countries choose to stage the Games not just because they like sports but also because they want to showcase their country, people, culture and political systems.
There will be a predictable backlash by athletes complaining that they don't want to feel pressured to answer questions of a political nature posed by the international media. And they shouldn't feel compelled to do so. Athletes are as free to comment on human rights abuses as they are to keep silent.
Meanwhile, ordinary Chinese are appalled that athletes from other countries would want to protest against China, or that a celebrity as famous as Steven Spielberg would boycott the Games -- assuming that they have heard the news at all.
Beijing's theme for the Olympics is "One world, one dream." As countries begin to abandon the "see no evil" policy for athletes, Beijing is about to discover that while we may inhabit one world, the dreams are many.
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