{"id":904,"date":"2021-10-20T16:33:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-20T13:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/?p=904"},"modified":"2021-10-20T16:33:01","modified_gmt":"2021-10-20T13:33:01","slug":"ioc-urged-to-postpone-genocide-beijing-gamesnew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/ioc-urged-to-postpone-genocide-beijing-gamesnew\/","title":{"rendered":"IOC URGED TO POSTPONE \u2018GENOCIDE\u2019 BEIJING GAMESNEW"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Asean Post.<\/a> 20 October 2021<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Below is an article published by The Asean Post.<\/a> Photo:AFP.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Activists on Tuesday called for the postponement of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics as China prepared to receive the Olympic flame, a day after a protest disrupted the lighting ceremony in Olympia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is sports-washing. There are no legitimate reasons to host the Games during a genocide,\u201d Zumretay Arkin, advocacy manager of the World Uighur Congress, told a news conference in the Greek capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor sure there will be protests (in China) by Uighurs, Tibetans,\u201d said Arkin, who said she has had no contact with her family since 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lit on Monday in Ancient Olympia, the cradle of the ancient Games, the flame will be handed over to the delegation from Beijing 2022 at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens, where the Olympics were revived in 1896, and will be flown to China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the ceremony in Olympia on Monday, the activists unfurled a Tibetan flag and a banner that said \u201cno genocide\u201d at the Games. A similar protest was held at the Acropolis in Athens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tibet has alternated over the centuries between independence and control by China, which says it \u201cpeacefully liberated\u201d the rugged plateau in 1951 and brought infrastructure and education to the previously underdeveloped region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But human rights campaigners and exiles say the Chinese central government practises religious repression, torture, forced sterilisation and cultural erosion through forced re-education.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Campaigners believe that at least one million Uighurs and other Turkic-speaking, mostly Muslim minorities are incarcerated in camps in Xinjiang.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After initially denying the existence of the Xinjiang camps, China later defended them as vocational training centres aimed at reducing the appeal of Islamic extremism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWho is going to guarantee that none of my relatives are actually now working in forced labour factories producing clothing and uniforms for the Olympic Games,\u201d Arkin said Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCan anyone tell me where my relatives are? I don\u2019t think so.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The activists on Tuesday said Hong Kong residents, Tibetans and Uighurs faced \u201cOrwellian\u201d surveillance in China, which they said was \u201cemboldened\u201d after hosting the Summer Games in 2008.GET INSIGHTS ON ASEAN IN YOUR INBOX <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The IOC is legitimising \u201cone of the worst violations of human rights in the entire 21st century\u201d and defiling the spirit of the Games, said Pema Doma, campaigns director for Students for a Free Tibet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Within Our Remit\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese Games cannot go ahead as planned, they must be postponed,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IOC chairman Thomas Bach has batted off talk of a potential boycott, claiming the International Olympic Committee\u2019s political neutrality and saying it was up to governments to live up to their responsibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A victim of the 1980 Moscow Games boycott, the former fencer has said such moves only punish athletes, and insists the IOC was addressing the rights issue \u201cwithin our remit\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Around 2,900 athletes, representing approximately 85 National Olympic Committees, will compete in the Winter Games between 4 and 20 February, 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arkin said the campaign \u201cto train light on all the different abuses\u201d was stronger than that of 2008, bringing together \u201cUighur communities, Hong Kong communities, Tibetan, Southern Mongolian, Chinese and Taiwanese communities\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo one can stop us. Not the IOC, not governments, not sponsors, not athletes. We will not stop,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Asean Post. 20 October 2021 Below is an article published by The Asean Post. Photo:AFP. Activists on Tuesday called for the postponement of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics as China prepared to receive the Olympic flame, a day after a protest disrupted<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=904"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":905,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904\/revisions\/905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}