China has reacted angrily to the US government’s diplomatic boycott of next year’s Winter Olympics, as more nations said they would consider joining the protest over Beijing’s human rights record and New Zealand announced that it would not send representatives to the Games.
Chinese officials dismissed Washington’s boycott as “posturing and political manipulation,” and tried to discredit the decision by claiming that US diplomats had not even been invited to Beijing.
The White House on Monday said that it would not send any official or diplomatic representatives to the Winter Games and Paralympics in February, “given the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China’s] ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses.”
Photo: AFP
“The athletes on Team USA have our full support,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said. “We will be behind them 100 percent as we cheer them on from home. We will not be contributing to the fanfare of the Games.”
New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Grant Robertson yesterday confirmed that his nation would not send diplomatic representatives at a ministerial level.
Robertson cited COVID-19 as the primary reason, “but we’ve made clear to China on numerous occasions our concerns about human rights issues,” he said.
In Taipei, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) yesterday told a news briefing that the government understands and respects Washington’s decision to boycott the Games.
The government is still collecting information about the issue and would convene an interagency meeting before responding to the boycott, she said.
Presidential Office spokesman Xavier Chang (張惇涵) gave a similar response, adding that the government would protect athletes’ rights to compete at the Games and provide them with all the necessary assistance.
The UK, Canada and Australia have said they are considering their positions, while Lithuania, which is facing trade and diplomatic hostilities from China over its growing relationship with Taiwan, last week announced that neither its president nor any ministers would attend the Games.
Chinese officials responded to the US announcement with outrage and also dismissal.
Former Chinese ambassador to the UK Liu Xiaoming (劉曉明) said the Olympics were “not a stage for political posturing and manipulation.”
“US politicians keep hyping a ‘diplomatic boycott’ without even being invited to the Games. This wishful thinking and pure grandstanding is aimed at political manipulation,” Liu wrote on Twitter. “It is a grave travesty of the spirit of the Olympic Charter, a blatant political provocation and a serious affront to the 1.4 billion Chinese people. It will only make the Chinese people and the world see clearly US politicians’ anti-China nature and hypocrisy.”
Liu’s posts mirrored the language of several other Chinese officials before and after the announcement.
Boycott calls have intensified as dozens of governments mull how to respond to Beijing’s continued crackdown on ethnic minorities in China, its intervention in Hong Kong and other human rights issues.
Demands have further escalated over the case of Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai (彭帥), who was not seen for almost three weeks after posting online an accusation of sexual assault against former Chinese vice premier Zhang Gaoli (張高麗).
Rights groups welcomed the US announcement and called for other governments to follow suit.
Mark Clifford, president of the UK-based advocacy group Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong, said global leaders had been “shown the way” by the US.
“Work with the US and Lithuania and take up the only morally justifiable course of action by implementing diplomatic boycotts of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing — or accept that you are endorsing some of the most horrific abuses inflicted upon a population by their own government in modern times,” Clifford said.
Additional reporting by Lin Chia-nan and CNA
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
MIXED SOURCING: While Taiwan is expanding domestic production, it also sources munitions overseas, as some, like M855 rounds, are cheaper than locally made ones Taiwan and the US plan to jointly produce 155mm artillery shells, as the munition is in high demand due to the Ukraine-Russia war and should be useful in Taiwan’s self-defense, Armaments Bureau Director-General Lieutenant General Lin Wen-hsiang (林文祥) told lawmakers in Taipei yesterday. Lin was responding to questions about Taiwan’s partnership with allies in producing munitions at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee. Given the intense demand for 155mm artillery shells in Ukraine’s defense against the Russian invasion, and in light of Taiwan’s own defensive needs, Taipei and Washington plan to jointly produce 155mm shells, said Lin,
RSS