Reject Beijing’s bid to host the 2022 Winter Olympics
Dear International Olympic Committee Members:
We urge you to reject Beijing’s bid for the 2022 Winter Olympics as China is now facing a human rights crisis with a scale of violations that is unprecedented since 2008.
As we write this letter, the Chinese government is carrying out an unparalleled attack on civil society. More than 250 Chinese human-rights lawyers, legal assistants, activists and their family members have been arrested, interrogated, put under house arrest and made to disappear since July 9. The youngest is 16 and the oldest 81.
Beijing has been using the Olympic Games to promote the Chinese Communist Party. If the International Olympic Committee awards Beijing the 2022 Winter Olympics, a great event intended to promote solidarity, brotherhood and human development will once again serve a corrupt dictatorship. It will endorse a government that blatantly violates human rights. Awarding Beijing the Olympics is a contradiction of the Olympics’ goal of “promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.”
The 2008 Summer Olympics made a mockery of the fine principles that the Olympics stands for, and brought more humiliation than dignity and more sadness than joy to the people in China.
In the name of the Olympics, Beijing forcibly relocated 1.5 million residents and evicted thousands of households. Hundreds of petitioners—as well as handicapped people—were detained in secret detention centers as part of the government’s effort to “clean up” the capital for the games. To put forth a good face for the Olympics, Beijing covered up a nationwide powdered milk scandal, which seriously affected the health of some 360,000 babies in China by 2008. The government also banned record-holding athlete Fang Zheng from the Paralympics because his legs were crushed by a tank in the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre.
To win the 2008 Olympics, China promised to allow space for Chinese citizens to protest during the games. Spaces were allocated, but those that applied for permission to hold protests were actually arrested, making a mockery of China’s promises to the IOC. We expect similar abuses to take place should you award China the 2022 Winter Olympics.
We feel utterly ashamed of such a notorious human rights record, which not only contradicts Beijing’s own promises, but also severely tarnishes the reputation and spirit of the Olympic Games.
Beijing promised to improve press freedom in order to win the 2008 Olympics. Instead, the Chinese media have experienced even more censorship and crackdowns. China has been denying work visas to a number of foreign journalists who cover “sensitive” issues. The country is the world’s largest jailer of journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Allowing Beijing to host the 2022 Winter Olympics would send the world a message that China’s human rights abuses are being endorsed by the IOC, making the 2022 Games look strikingly similar to the 1936 Berlin Olympics and the 1980 Moscow Olympics.
We believe that the pure Olympic dream should never serve political oppression by a host government. We dream that one day the sacred Olympic flame will cast a light on a free China. For now, under this government, any more Olympic games would go down in history as the Shame Games, and make the IOC an accomplice in the abuse of human rights in the name of the Olympics.