Germany Warns China Olympics at Risk (Update: France Considering Boycott)

reply to post by biggie smalls


Wow! I'm surprised by this..

Good on the Germans I say
Maybe the Irish will be next, doubt Britain will because of 2012, but who knows.

Although this doesn't directly tie into a boycott, I found both articles below relevant to the Olympics themselves:

Beijing to BAN smoking

Beijing is to ban smoking in most public places from May 1 as part of its efforts to improve the city ahead of the Olympics, state media reported on Monday.
Lighting up in the Chinese capital will be prohibited in all restaurants, offices and schools, becoming the first city in China to have such a comprehensive ban, the China Daily reported.

Hotels must also have rooms for non-smokers, but the proportion is still being discussed, a tobacco control expert involved in drafting the new rule told the paper.

Bars, meanwhile, will be required to clearly separate smoking from non-smoking areas, according to the newspaper.

Rather strange, but I guess they want Beijing to look "clean." It isn't uncommon for everywhere in Europe to allow smoking inside (maybe not London these days) and pretty much only New York has banned it in the states (I could be wrong).

Again, another "save-face" campaign by the Chinese. Let's just ignore their human rights violations because they banned smoking inside. I'm all for it...


Olympic torch re-lit in Beijing

The Olympic torch was re-lit Monday at an elaborate ceremony that signaled the start of a round-the-world relay that is expected to be a lightning rod for protests against China's policies and human rights practices.

President Hu Jintao opened the relay at an elaborate ceremony in Tiananmen Square in the heart of the capital, underlining the importance China places on the Olympics and its hopes to display a confident, strong nation to the world when the Games open Aug. 8.

The ceremony 130 days before the start of the Olympics was broadcast on state television, and comes a week after the lighting ceremony for the Olympic torch in Greece was marred by protests.

At least the protests were mentioned in the article, albeit very briefly.

How long before the torch is blocked by protesters I wonder? A few days?

Thankyou KM S@F for your OP and a new friend on my list. Please let this be the beginning of a total boycott of China's brutality and a sign that there are more sympathisers that cannot be controlled by propaganda than they could have ever imagined. They will have to free Tibet or face much worse fate than the boycott of the 2008 Olympics. China, the time has come to respect all sentient beings and their right to live in freedom and worship and pray as they choose. Grow with this new passion for the traditions of your beautiful country.

Pelosi: President Should Consider Boycotting Olympics' Opening

What a flip-flopper! First she talks along the lines of "free tibet" and now she is asking Bush to boycott the opening ceremony.

These people are worthless. The Chinese don't give a crap if you skip the opening ceremony. The West and Russia need to boycott the entire games. Forget the athletes, they'll live. We should be more worried about the Chinese people and those who are hurt by this regime.

A boycott would send message to the Chinese:

We don't like what you've been doing and you need to stop if you want any respect or trade with the rest of the world.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi does not want the U.S. to boycott the Beijing Olympics, but she says that President George W. Bush should consider skipping the opening ceremony.

"I think boycotting the opening ceremony, which really gives respect to the Chinese government, is something that should be kept on the table," Pelosi, D-Calif., told "Good Morning America" co-anchor Robin Roberts in an interview airing Tuesday. "I think the president might want to rethink this later, depending on what other heads of state do."

Nancy you're a joke, an absolute joke. Why don't you grow some balls and stand up for what you promised.

Free trade and mutual understanding will eventually do the job. Chinese people's view of the west and westerners' view about China will eventually adjust itself to the real pictures. Boycotting won't make that happen but impede that goal.

Boycotting the Olympic game is actually boycotting ourselves. So much misunderstanding between Chinese and westerners can only be eliminated by dialogues.

[edit on 1-4-2008 by fuelcell]

Free trade and mutual understanding will eventually do the job. Chinese people's view of the west and westerners' view about China will eventually adjust themself to to the real pictures. Boycotting won't make that happen but impede that.

Boycotting the Olympic game is actually boycotting ourselves. So much misunderstanding between Chinese people and westerners can only be eliminated by dialogues.

[edit on 1-4-2008 by fuelcell]

Originally posted by SevenThunders
I doubt the CIA is instigating this.

www.indymedia.org.uk...

"Democratic Imperialism": Tibet, China, and the National Endowment for Democracy

I don't think the CIA is linked with the political call for boycots though, we are dealing with democratic politicians who need to keep their voters happy, so of course they need to do something. Another article could shed more lights of the real motives of politicians like Merkel.

www.timesonline.co.uk...

China failed to understand that politicians in democracies cannot predict what positions they will take. Spielberg’s d�marche has changed everything for them. In a few weeks they have moved from avoiding anything that might offend Beijing to scrambling to be seen as pro-Tibetan. It scarcely matters whether the riots in Lhasa were, at least in part, brutal and racist, nor that such violence is in defiance of the Dalai Lama’s strictures and undermines his authority. The Tibet bandwagon is rolling and every democratic politician clamours for a place on board.

As western politicians are exposed as being powerless to avert economic downturn and as Iraq and Afghanistan smoulder on, heaping opprobrium on China offers an agreeable opportunity to divert attention from the politicians’ other woes.

A boycott is not likely to happen with too much stakes (MONEY) in the trade.

Why don't people think more rationally like another poster and start to understand that not every country on Earth is holding the same beliefs as you? And that not every single system should be the same as a Western democratic one?

Chinese common people are starting to get angry, some furious, some very emotional and most will never understand why a Westerner and their politicians would spend so much effort in bashing China and abusing a "holy" event like the Olympic Games. Of course there were some judgments mistakes made by the Chinese leaders and now the West is using the Olympics as a political weapon.

Some interesting closing passages of the times' article

The ceremonies on which he was advising will provide the next focus. They can be shunned without disrupting the sporting events which supposedly are the point of the Olympics. Indeed, once the politicians have aligned themselves with Tibet and Darfur, what justification could they offer for allowing the regime to bask in global adulation?

This is most likely the middle-way many politicians will make to avoid losing voters, but trying to maintain the economic relations with China.

When China bid for the Olympics it judged correctly that democratic politicians are pusillanimous. Given their hunger for Chinese contracts they would not let massacre in Darfur or torture in Tibet disrupt a good party. But Beijing failed to see that western statesmen are even more craven towards their celebrities and media.

One thing unfortunately for the world and in contradicting with the common Western belief that the Chinese common people have no access to foreign news, it is far from true, this (see Ex quote) is also what the Chinese common people will see. That biased Western MSM and so-called Celebrities (Incl Dalai Lama) have more say in the Western politics than what is good for the country. This is why you see nationalism is rising quickly and fastly among the Chinese population. Maybe with the help of some extra pushes here and there (State media, common man rumors etc etc) then you will see that for the first time in Chinese history the Western media indirectly created a united nationalistic nation in China. This is something that no other Chinese leaders or emporers could have dreamt of.

Beijing’s other mistake was being too anxious for the Games to be a success. A man who wants something too much makes himself vulnerable. Surely Confucius said something of the sort.

It is vulnerable now seemingly, but even the Olympics are really plainout being boycotted, it might turn out to be the perfect tool to fuel the common people's anger even more.

Now maybe I should elaborate why the Chinese common people is angry now? Because of censorships or propaganda? Maybe, but only partly, Chinese common people know the State media is not disclosing the full truth, but they also know that Western MSM is being biased and full of lies, nobody care if there is a dude out there trying to make a objective report, this perspection is already created, thanks to CNN and the like.

What westerners very often too easy forget is that Chinese people hold different norms and values and consider different things in life more important. These beliefs and values are sometimes the opposite of what a Westerner consider to be the standard values of life. Forcefully forcing certain values into the most populous nation and longest history&tradition-rich population and culture? That will never work, like I stated before, it will only anger and unite the common people even more.

What westerners and Chinese people should do, is to talk and understand each other norms and values in an open and respectful way. Politicians yelling boycots or even only the opening ceremonies are not helping the cause. Boycotting the Olympics will certainly cause mayhem and disrespectful from the Chinese population towards the "agressors/barbarians" for the coming decades or even centuries to come. The Chinese nation thinks in terms of generations and not merely years, like democratic governments too often do.

So the initial so-called judgment mistakes might be not as bad as for the Chinese leaders. After all, what is done is done, we need to use the threats and risks as our opportunity to come out even stronger.

So personally I will not mourn too much if a full-out boycot is really going to happen. Yet, I would rather see and highly prefer that the Olympics is used to understand the world and the world understand China more. After all, the world is only so-big, but it is small, we have to live peacefully in harmony next to each other for many many many millenia to come.


[edit on 1/4/08 by IchiNiSan]

Chinese make Olympic security a priority

Don't want any Tibetan protesters to ruin your pretty little games now do we?

The Chinese president, Hu Jintao, has ordered his nation's security forces to place a top priority on the Olympics in August, saying that the country's international reputation was at stake.

The comments came against a backdrop of increasing Chinese accusations that Tibetans were planning violent attacks in their quest for increased autonomy, which the Tibetans deny.

"Security must take priority," Hu was quoted as saying in the People's Armed Police News, published by China's paramilitary police force. "Without security guarantees there cannot be a successful Olympic Games, and without security guarantees the national image will be lost."

You wouldn't want the West to see how you treat your dissidents, that would be bad press. Just make sure they don't see your cat death camps or political prisoner gestapo prisons either.

Their paranoia justifce any meassures.

Here's the latest one from Beijing.

China alleges Tibetan 'suicide squads'

Wu Heping, spokesman for China's Ministry of Public Security, claimed searches of monasteries in the Tibetan capital had turned up a large cache of weapons. They included 176 guns, 13,013 bullets, 7,725 pounds of explosives, 19,000 sticks of dynamite and 350 knives, he said.

"To our knowledge, the next plan of the Tibetan independence forces is to organize suicide squads to launch violent attacks," Wu told a news conference. "They claimed that they fear neither bloodshed nor sacrifice."

Wu provided no details or evidence. He used the term "gan si dui," a rarely used phrase directly translated as "dare-to-die corps." The official English version of his remarks translated the term as "suicide squads."

I believe this to be more propaganda than paranoia, actually. To justify any meassures they have to put in place against those 'terrorist monks.'

I have been keeping track of this situatuion for a couple months now...

www.abovetopsecret.com...


I was pretty much the only person on the thread... i guess i had it in the wroung fourm...

and you gott like 100 replies in like a week... by posting the same info i had on my thread...


JUst head on over to the thread I posted eariler, to get my ideas on the topic...

reply to post by khunmoon


Khunmoon, I just want to highlight a minor point about the disruption of the opening torch event. The people who disrupted it was from "Reporters Without Borders".. and we all knows who funds them.

Now looking at all the distorted media hype.. from tainted products to everything and anything Chinese, well organised riots and protest, which have C!A backhand. Don't you think, there are much more to this ?

Apart from the tibet riots and well organised (and Funded) Tibetan exile groups. That's also a hijack tourist Bus and hijack attempt on a Chinese commercial plane. While all this happened in succession. In another region of Xijiang, almost a thousand more East Turkestan Organisation members also staged two rebellion in the provincial old capital. "Reporters without borders, Exiled Tibetan and East Turkestan Organisation (based in Turkey), all are known C!A affiliates... and all at happenned in succession ?

As one former US President once said something like this, "In politics there is no coincidence, if there are, you damn well know it's planned that way".. and to me this is one of it.

Loking back, when US media network and allies are all going in a certain preset mode. It crank up my suspicion, because simply look at all the perceived enemy each elected administration embark on .. all looked similar. Think about it.

reply to post by khunmoon
It's not too far fetched. Looking at all the seemingly violent tibetan protest at outside many Chinese ambassy in various country. You know using Religion to incite hatred and thus the path to violence... is not all that difficult.. just look at the Middle East clerics.

I mean during the organised foreign diplomat visit to post riot Tibet. I read that in one Monastery.. a huge weapon cache was found. Why are arms stored in Monastery.. are those really monks. I'm confused, isnt buddhism about emptiness ? yet we have monks who goes to war with each other for centuries in tibet, dalai lamas as head of state, owns slaves, serfs, sex slaves, administers torture. Something is really wrong here.

It is difficult to asses with any certainty truth 100% accurately, mainly because of world media seems so keen to hang Chinese Government by the nearest tree.
We all know who's behind these media don't we?
I am always for nice and peaceful solution to any conflict of interests but it seems odd those riots started just before the Olympics isn't it?
It is well orchestrated to cause the best impact and gain maximum coverage and perhaps forcing China into some deal that they would normally refused.
It is important they preserve face, control any rioting and present safe environment for the games.
All this amounts to great disturbance and it was obviously well orchestrated and controled by Tibetan masterminds.
It is understandable they want to achieve their goals but so do Chinese right?
After all, policing massive country like that with population of almost 1.5 BILLION is not the same as controlling borders and crime in Swiss is it?
They have to be tougher! If you let criminals go unpunished like in the west and be lenient and start filling the prisons then you are gonna be in a trouble very soon.
In America more then 1% of population is in prisons! Are you aware of that! If you allowed that kind of attitude and leniency in Chine we would look at 20-40 million People rotting in prisons very soon.

[edit on 2-4-2008 by Apolon]

reply to post by mobydog


Thank you for joining in moby.

Now I can agree to a point that CIA might be behind some of the things you mention, but I never heard that Reporters sans frontier should be CIA, and as it is a French organisation I find it hard to believe.

Also --though they might be suspected for being behind some of the rioting-- I cannot believe CIA should have anything to do with tainted medicin or tainted pet fodder or what paint Chinese manufactors put on toys. They are solely the results of a purely regulated bonanza economy that is the motive power behind all the ambitions of CCP, and it is them well deserved when they don't care about the colour of the cat. Unfortunately in that process they don't care about human lives either.

But again that lack of respect for human life is trait in oriental cultures, not only Chinese, that's always been there, but should have been weeded out long ago in a modern state that so bad wants to be part of a modern world. Meant in an humanistic sense.

Let's face it, China's appetite for Tibet has nothing to do with liberating a backward feudal culture, but solely to get their hands on it's wealth of mineral riches, it's generally untouched forests and endless pastures, and what that already has and will cause of ecological disaster can only be feared, knowing what damage two decades of economic development has done to the enviroment and people of wide parts of China.

It is not that I would envy the Chinese people to have greater wealth through development, it's the way it is done, reckless and without any concerns to other than profit. Now before you get at it, I'm (too) well aware what Western capitalist corporations do it in that matter --without concern to other than their shareholders-- but after all they run the governments (unfortunately), so though I don't condone it, I feel it should be different in a communist state, in fact it should be the other way around. That it not is so in China, only makes it that more a crime against the people and the land.

What is going on in todays world is plunder and rape, but the Chinese with their ancient culture and wisdom should be too good to do so. They should, with that heritage in mind, try to find a more tranquil and gentle way of development, and there they could learn something from the Tibetan culture ...now they have liberated them from the serfdom you mention.

The torture and sexslave part I never heard about, but you can attribute that to Mao Zedung. He got a new bunch of peasant girls brought in every week.

That's what I heard.



edit spellng



[edit on 2/4/2008 by khunmoon]

Some analysis to shed more lights on the actual causes and real trouble makers. (Note: I am still only posting non-Chinese sources)

Article 1: Tibet the 'great game' and the CIA
Article 2: "Democratic Imperialism": Tibet, China, and the National Endowment for Democracy
Article 3: The Tibet Card


Article 1
www.globalresearch.ca...

Tibet, the 'great game' and the CIA

by Richard M Bennett

Global Research, March 25, 2008

Given the historical context of the unrest in Tibet, there is reason to believe Beijing was caught on the hop with the recent demonstrations for the simple reason that their planning took place outside of Tibet and that the direction of the protesters is similarly in the hands of anti-Chinese organizers safely out of reach in Nepal and northern India.

Similarly, the funding and overall control of the unrest has also been linked to Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, and by inference to the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) because of his close cooperation with US intelligence for over 50 years.

Article 2
Here another article

www.globalresearch.ca...

"Democratic Imperialism": Tibet, China, and the National Endowment for Democracy
by Michael Barker

Global Research, August 13, 2007

People familiar with Asian history will be aware that during Tibet’s popular uprising against their Chinese occupiers in 1959, his Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama (then aged 23), escaped from his homeland of Tibet to live in exile in India. Subsequently, the Dalai Lama formed a Tibetan government-in-exile, and to this day the Dalai Lama and his government remain in exile. The Dalai Lama’s tireless efforts to draw international attention to the Tibetan cause received a welcome boost in 1989 when he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and since then the Dalai Lama has been able to demand sustained media attention (globally) to his ongoing non-violent struggle for a free Tibet. This part of Tibetan history is fairly uncontroversial, but a part of Tibet’s story that less people will be familiar with is Tibet’s historical links to the US’s Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Indeed, as Carole McGranahan (2006) notes “[t]he case of Tibet presents a mostly unexplored example of covert Cold War military intervention.”[1]

While in recent years far more information has been made available concerning the CIA’s violent linkages with Tibetan forces, to date only one article has examined the connection between Tibet’s current independence campaigners and an organization that maintains close ties with the CIA, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

Article 3
Yet another article

www.globalresearch.ca...

The Tibet Card

by Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich

Global Research, March 27, 2008

It seems that the US government excels at propaganda for it continues to win over the very people it has betrayed and caused to be killed; buying their trust, it offers a friendship that is only self-serving. Oblivious to the past havoc wreaked by the CIA in Tibet, the innocent gather around the storm, stare into the eye, ready to be sucked into it, says Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich.

reply to post by TKainZero


Interesting thread you got there TK.

I must admit it has surpassed me, both the news and your thread.

I have heard about the problem, and I think it must have been a year ago Danish press brought it up.

I've done a little research after you brought it up, and while the part of refraining from political and religious demonstration has been part of the IOC charter at least since 1968 (Black Panther demo in Mexico) I would like to know if others than the British --and NZ it seems-- have tried to force such a gag order on their athletes.

Found a few articles and it seems the BOC had to redraw or rephrase their gag order.

Here's a couple of links.

No 'talking ban' for UK Olympians
Political expression hovers over Beijing preparations

Boycotting the Olympics...sounds good in theory, but what will actually happen? Who gets hurt? The governing Politburo, or the little people just trying to get by day to day, both in Tibet and elsewhere in China? I'm guessing the little people.

Send the teams, have 'em wear Tibetan costumes, or "free Tibet" pins. Absolutly no "gag" rule, let the boys and girls say whatevers on their minds, concerning China, or Tibet, or whatever. What are they going to do, deport whole Olympic teams? Doubtful. China should never have been given the Games, IMHO. Tienanmen Square alone shold have ruled that out. Someone got very rich. If I thought a boycott would change anything in Tibet or elsewhere in China, or would change Chinese policies, I'd be behind it without reservation.

A boycott will wind up hurting more than helping. I doubt I'll watch much if any of the Oympics...my hypocricy goes only so far. Which sucks, because I am a huge fan of the Olympics.

[edit on 4/2/2008 by seagull]

reply to post by IchiNiSan


Hey buddy! Long time no see, lol.

Just wanted to post this here too, as it's relevant to a point already brought up earlier in this thread, and the PRC's desperation to spread as much disinfo as possible to save face before the games....

en.wikipedia.org...

Originally posted by IchiNiSan
Some analysis to shed more lights on the actual causes and real trouble makers. (Note: I am still only posting non-Chinese sources)

Article 1: Tibet the 'great game' and the CIA
Article 2: "Democratic Imperialism": Tibet, China, and the National Endowment for Democracy
Article 3: The Tibet Card

What a joke. You keep pointing the Dalai Lama's past connection to the CIA as if it somehow takes away from the fact that China brutally oppresses the Tibetans. Sure, the CIA may be using the situation to embarrass China before the Olympics, I guess. But again, if they really don't want to be embarrassed, they should stop treating the people of Tibet the way they do.

Seems to me, with the self-esteem problem the PRC has, that it is more in their interest to stage these riots to try and present some sort of justification for their treatment of the Tibetans to the world before the games. After all, the Dalai Lama has condemned the violence, and even threatened to step down. But according to all our brigade members here, the "evil" Dalai Lama is just saying that as a public relations stunt.

Here's an article from a while back....

WASHINGTON, Oct. 17 — Over furious objections from China and in the presence of President Bush, Congress on Wednesday bestowed its highest civilian honor on the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists whom Beijing considers a troublesome voice of separatism.

Dressed in flowing robes of dark burgundy and bright orange, Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, beamed and bowed as the president and members of Congress greeted him with a standing ovation and then praised him as a hero of the Tibetan struggle. President Bush called him “a man of faith and sincerity and peace.”

But the Dalai Lama said he felt “a sense of regret” over the sharp tensions with China unleashed by his private meeting on Tuesday with Mr. Bush and by the Congressional Gold Medal conferred on him in the ornate Capitol Rotunda.

In gentle language and conciliatory tones, he congratulated China on its dynamic economic growth and recognized its rising role on the world stage, but also gently urged it to embrace “transparency, the rule of law and freedom of information.”

The 72-year-old spiritual leader made clear that “I’m not seeking independence” from China, something that is anathema to Beijing. Nor, he said, would he use any future agreement with China “as a steppingstone for Tibet’s independence.”

What he wanted, he said, was “meaningful autonomy for Tibet.”

www.nytimes.com...

Here's the Dalai Lama's own words regarding help from the CIA...

Q: In Tibet, from the late 1950's until the early 1970's, one of your
brothers was involved in leading a guerrilla movement against the Chinese.
In fact, the guerrillas were supported by the C.I.A. How did you feel about
that?

A: I'm always against violence. But the Tibetan guerrillas were very
dedicated people. They were willing to sacrifice their own lives for the
Tibetan nation. And they found a way to receive help from the C.I.A. Now,
the C.I.A.'s motivation for helping was entirely political. They did not
help out of genuine sympathy, not out of support for a just cause. That was
not very healthy.

Today, the help and support we receive from the United States is truly
out of sympathy and human compassion. In spite of their desire for good
relations with China, the Congress of the United States at least supports
Tibetan human rights. So this is something really precious, genuine.

www.sacred-texts.com...

Yeah, what an evil man he is...

reply to post by Sky watcher

That would hurt them more then it would us. We would not pay them because they got all that money Illegally and we can prove it in a world court. China has violated every WTO agreement it promised to uphold. The second everyone in America stops buying Chinas crap it is them that will crumble not us, We can buy from anyone we want and we can also make anything we want.

If people honestly believed this they would stop buying from Wal Mart.

Link

Link2

I'm so anti Wally World it isn't funny.I try,as much as I'm able,to buy "Made in Canada" or "Made in the U.S.A.I pay a bit more up front but at least I don't have to buy 100 $15 toasters.We fuel China because of our throw away mentality and the thought of a good bargain.In the end it's neither of those things.
I started saying last year on my blog that people should boycott the Olympics.China's oppressive nature is horrendous, and I for one won't contribute to it's economy.
I applaud the nations making their voices heard.