China may be repressing dissidents in Tibet and Xinjiang and jailing dissidents, but the International Olympic Committee says everything is hunky dory:
BEIJING, April 3 — After nearly seven years of careful preparations, it came down to one final, marathon session in Beijing on Thursday. It was the third and final day of talks between Chinese officials and the International Olympic Committee’s operations team, the last big inspection ahead of the Aug. 8-24 Summer Games.
The chief of the operations team, Hein Verbruggen, headed to a podium to assure the world that Beijing was on the right track, capable of a “gold medal performance” on everything from providing Internet access and media services to protecting the Olympics brand from piracy.
But almost every question at a news conference Thursday was about China’s human rights record. Or possible boycotts by politicians and activists. Or protests by athletes competing in the Games or during the Olympic torch relay.
“A lot of things have happened . . . that have caught the headlines,” one reporter said, asking whether the unrest in Tibet, disruptions to the Olympic torch relay or film director Steven Spielberg’s resignation as artistic director over Darfur and China’s ties to Sudan had soured or changed the way the Games are viewed.
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In an indication of how the Olympics have been overshadowed by political concerns, Verbruggen’s comments at the news conference were both forceful and slightly weary.
“It’s not the first time that I’m saying this. It’s not up to us to comment on those cases,” he said. “It’s a matter of Chinese law, and it’s not a matter of sport nor a matter for the Olympic Games or the IOC. . . . We are not a political organization.”
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“The question isn’t whether the IOC is a human rights organization,” Sophie Richardson, the group’s Asia advocacy director, said in a statement. “It’s whether the Olympic movement respects human rights.”
The answer, it would seem, is a big fat no.
