With the Tokyo Summer Olympics expected to be the most underwhelming event in the history of the modern games (that is, if safety officials from the IOC ultimately allow it to continue), pressure for an international boycott of the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing is growing. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi just became the first senior American official to call for a boycott of the China games over Beijing’s treatment of Uygher Muslims in the far-flung northwestern province of Xinjiang.
Heads of state who go to China for the Olympics in light of genocide would not have moral authority to speak out about human rights, Pelosi insisted according to a newswire report.
She also called out the corporate sponsors of the game for “looking the other way” at China’s human rights abuses.
“How sad it is to see the Olympic corporate sponsors look the other way on China’s abuses out of concern for their bottom line.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls for diplomatic boycott of 2022 Beijing Olympics over China’s forced labor practices:
“How sad it is to see the Olympic corporate sponsors look the other way on China’s abuses out of concern for their bottom line.” pic.twitter.com/S16nUOGCiZ
— The Recount (@therecount) May 18, 2021
Beijing has responded to accusations that it’s carrying out a genocide of the Uyghers have turned accusations back around on the US, citing instances of police brutality, and America’s history of slavery, as signs of hypocrisy.
Pelosi’s decision follows an even more forceful call from a group representing other other minorities who have been oppressed by Beijing. The group explicitly accuses those who support the Games of giving tacit approval of genocide representing the people of Hong Kong, Uyghur Muslims and Tibetans, released a statement calling for the boycott on Monday. It also accused the IOC of deciding “to put profit before human lives and turn a blind eye to genocide,” according to the Daily Caller and Associated Press.
Support for a boycott is bipartisan, with high-profile Republicans like former UN Ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikke Haley responding to calls from the group mentioned above by endorsing their call and saying it would be “unthinkable” for the world to ignore what Beijing has done to the Uyghers.
It is unthinkable that the world will participate in the Beijing Olympics while Communist China commits genocide.
I stand with the Uyghurs, Tibetans, and the residents of Hong Kong for a boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympics.https://t.co/AhgJtShaQb
— Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) May 17, 2021
Thank you to these groups for helping lead the charge.@UyghurCongress @SFTHQ @CUyghurs @wethehongkonger @KeepTaiwanFree_ @tibetaction
— Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) May 17, 2021
The statement said that the time for negotiations with Beijing over its abuses has passed, and that a full-on boycott is the only moral option available. “The time for talking with the IOC is over,” Lhadon Tethong of the Tibet Action Institute said in an exclusive interview with the AP. “This cannot be games as usual or business as usual; not for the IOC and not for the international community.”
Human Rights groups have met several times in the past year with the IOC, asking that the games be removed from China. A key member in those talks was Zumretay Arkin of the World Uyghur Congress.
And just last week, human rights groups and Western nations led by the US, the UK, and Germany accused China of massive crimes against the Uyghur minority and demanded unimpeded access for UN experts. At the meeting, Britain’s UN Ambassador, Barbara Woodward, called the situation in Xinjiang “one of the worst human rights crises of our time.”
“The evidence points to a program of repression of specific ethnic groups,” Woodward said. “Expressions of religion have been criminalized and Uyghur language and culture are discriminated against systematically and at scale.”
While President Joe Biden is probably a little too cozy with China to openly call for a boycott of the Winter Games, we wouldn’t be surprised to see President Trump, or other senior GOP, to highlight the president’s hypocrisy when it comes to China by joining with their own calls to back the boycott.
via zerohedge
Of course, Pelosi apparently cares nothing about American Citizens being held without charges or trial and tortured or have been murdered by government.