No U.S. official will attend Beijing Winter Olympics, White House announces
Source: Washington Post
The United States will not send President Biden or any U.S. government official to the Beijing Winter Olympics in February in a signal of displeasure over Chinas human rights abuses, the White House announced Monday. The diplomatic boycott allows American athletes to participate in the Games, but is a significant political snub of Washingtons greatest military and economic competitor.
Pressure to mount such a boycott has been building for months, with lawmakers from both parties and human rights advocates calling on the Biden administration not to attend in response to Beijings repressive policies against democracy activists in Hong Kong and Uyghur Muslims in the Xinjiang region. Biden told reporters last month he was weighing a diplomatic boycott.
The decision stands in contrast to 1980, when President Jimmy Carter kept U.S. officials and athletes out of the Summer Games in Moscow in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Though more than 60 countries joined the boycott in 1980, hundreds of American athletes were deprived of their chance at Olympic glory. The U.S. government cannot unilaterally bar athletes from the Olympics or declare a boycott. The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee, an independent nonprofit organization, has sole authority to make the final call.
I want to stress that the Winter Olympic Games is not a stage for political posturing and manipulation, said Zhao Lijian, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman, on Monday, responding to reports a boycott announcement was imminent. U.S. politicians keep hyping a diplomatic boycott without even being invited to the Games. This wishful thinking and pure grandstanding is aimed at political manipulation. 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.?
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/us-beijing-winter-olympics-diplomatic-boycott/2021/12/06/1d2e9920-56b1-11ec-9a18-a506cf3aa31d_story.html
HUAJIAO
(2,385 posts)(Of course, they are dangerous. That's a given)
But they speak to the outside world with the same not-so-subtle condescending, threatening, propagandistic language they use on their own people. It's all they know. Totally inhuman monsters. Sound familiar?
Now, I love Chinese culture and especially FOOD.. and was married to a Chinese woman, been to China many times... but...
dalton99a
(81,485 posts)ancianita
(36,055 posts)IronLionZion
(45,440 posts)which are very numbing and flavorful.
HUAJIAO
(2,385 posts)MALA
Chengdu forever!!!!!!!!!
IronLionZion
(45,440 posts)they seem to have cracked the code on how to get more pandas.
HUAJIAO
(2,385 posts)I know the BESTEST ingredient supply place- www.themalamarket.com
A mom and daughter who travel to Sichuan frequently and have great contacts there.
They are also in Facebook.
DSandra
(999 posts)Treatment of Native Americans, Blacks, the homeless, and mentally ill people, need I say more?
cinematicdiversions
(1,969 posts)To suggest otherwise is mind blowing.
DSandra
(999 posts)Officials in more rogue countries roll their eyes knowing that America is really doing it just for show, and pretend in being an exceptional nation to its citizens.
NYC Liberal
(20,136 posts)pecosbob
(7,538 posts)but we can't even hold the CCP's beer when talking about a government shitting on it's own citizens.
ancianita
(36,055 posts)oceanic shipping lanes that the U.S. Navy has kept clear for 100 years. Also about its incursions into Taiwan's airspace to menace our ally.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Liberation_Army_Navy#Territorial_dispute
Though we appear to China as the new kid on the planetary block who disses older nations and cultures (by millennia), it's also about our commander-in-chief standing up for our Navy that rules the oceans of the planet, and without it the world's transoceanic shipping trade wouldn't have become as stable as it has.
Biden and the administration wouldn't make this a one-issue decision.
dalton99a
(81,485 posts)Magoo48
(4,709 posts)This shit isnt good for anyone, anywhere. With real problems facing humanity, instead taking a stance which encourages multilateralism and cooperation, our foreign affairs people, obviously influenced by the arms industry, trots out the Edsel of international diplomacy.
Brilliant.
BumRushDaShow
(128,958 posts)The entire Olympic team was kept from participation.
In this case, it's only the political figures not attending but the U.S. Olympic team will compete.
iemanja
(53,032 posts)and I didn't care for Carter's move. At least the athletes will be able to go to this Olympics. They work their entire lives to get there.
BumRushDaShow
(128,958 posts)although as long as the Olympics is permitted to rotate to different countries outside of its origin country of Greece (as the "modern" form has), it will ultimately be politicized by someone. Note the 1936 one -
pecosbob
(7,538 posts)Props to the WTA.