Monday • August 6, 2007AFP
The Olympic spotlight is making the communist rulers of China more vulnerable to global pressure than ever before, rights groups and activists say as they ready for 12 months of intense campaigning.
Threatening to spoil the Beijing Olympic party are issues such as the violence in Sudan's Darfur region that has left hundreds of thousands dead, China's rule over Tibet, and its domestic curbs on religion and the media.
Throw in labour rights abuses in China, including by factories making Olympic goods, and the government is bracing for an onslaught from movements that believe the Games provide an unprecedented platform to further their cause.
"The coming year is absolutely crucial because we feel the Chinese are susceptible in a way that they have never been before," the London-based spokesman for the Free Tibet Campaign, Matt Whitticase, told AFP.
"We want to use this unprecedented opportunity to raise the Tibetan issue as much as possible and exert as much pressure as possible."
Groups hoping to pressure China to better wield its strong influence with the Sudanese government in ending the bloodshed in Darfur hold similar hopes for the Olympics.
"All groups that care about human rights see the Olympic spotlight and the platform that presents as an enormous opportunity," said Jill Savitt, the director of Olympic Dream for Darfur organisation.
The New York-based group was established solely to pressure the Chinese in the lead-up to the Olympics, and will disband once the Games are over.
"Our goal is to ensure that the Chinese government hears from a variety of sources about the concern that the Olympics will be tarnished if there is not security on the ground (in Darfur) before the Olympics begin," she told AFP.
So, as China celebrates the one-year countdown to the Games on Wednesday amid much hype and partying, groups around the world are using the date as a launch pad for their ramped-up publicity campaigns.
Dream for Darfur is planning to begin a parallel Olympic torch relay on the border between Darfur and Chad on August 8 with a "sombre ceremony and a prayer for peace", according to Sullivan.
The torch relay will eventually go to Rwanda, Armenia, Bosnia, Cambodia and Germany, all places with infamous records of the mass slaughter of people.
Chinese embassies around the world can also expect protests on August 8 from all kinds of movements, including Darfur campaigners, the free-Tibet voices and the Falungong spiritual group that China has denounced as an "evil cult."
Meanwhile, international rights groups such as Reporters Without Borders and Human Rights Watch plan to release reports during the one-year countdown week.
Even the official Olympic torch relay, which begins in Beijing on March 31 and will last 130 days, is expected to be dogged by protesters as it makes its way around the world.
"When the torch relay moves through places like Paris, London and San Francisco, where there are sizeable Tibetan populations, you can definitely expect Tibetans and Tibetan supporters to mark that," Whitticase said.
He emphasised that various groups were also joining forces in such areas as research and staging protests, pointing out that his Free Tibet Campaign organisation was linking up with Falungong and religious rights activists.
"Groups are coming together to try and maximise the impact of their actions," he said.
Play Fair 2008, a network aiming to improve workers' rights in the global sporting goods industry, put Olympic organisers on the defensive with a report in June that Games merchandise was being made in four Chinese factories using exploitative labour.
Olympic organisers last week terminated their contract with one of the companies.
Tim Noonan, campaign director for the International Trade Union Confederation that is part of the Play Fair movement, described the hosting of the Olympics as a "two-sided coin" for China.
"There was enormous benefit for China's image on the world stage," he said.
"But at the same time it gave enormous openings for groups inside and outside of China to put the spotlight on really serious problems in the way that the Chinese economic and political system is structured."
Threatening to spoil the Beijing Olympic party are issues such as the violence in Sudan's Darfur region that has left hundreds of thousands dead, China's rule over Tibet, and its domestic curbs on religion and the media.
Throw in labour rights abuses in China, including by factories making Olympic goods, and the government is bracing for an onslaught from movements that believe the Games provide an unprecedented platform to further their cause.
"The coming year is absolutely crucial because we feel the Chinese are susceptible in a way that they have never been before," the London-based spokesman for the Free Tibet Campaign, Matt Whitticase, told AFP.
"We want to use this unprecedented opportunity to raise the Tibetan issue as much as possible and exert as much pressure as possible."
Groups hoping to pressure China to better wield its strong influence with the Sudanese government in ending the bloodshed in Darfur hold similar hopes for the Olympics.
"All groups that care about human rights see the Olympic spotlight and the platform that presents as an enormous opportunity," said Jill Savitt, the director of Olympic Dream for Darfur organisation.
The New York-based group was established solely to pressure the Chinese in the lead-up to the Olympics, and will disband once the Games are over.
"Our goal is to ensure that the Chinese government hears from a variety of sources about the concern that the Olympics will be tarnished if there is not security on the ground (in Darfur) before the Olympics begin," she told AFP.
So, as China celebrates the one-year countdown to the Games on Wednesday amid much hype and partying, groups around the world are using the date as a launch pad for their ramped-up publicity campaigns.
Dream for Darfur is planning to begin a parallel Olympic torch relay on the border between Darfur and Chad on August 8 with a "sombre ceremony and a prayer for peace", according to Sullivan.
The torch relay will eventually go to Rwanda, Armenia, Bosnia, Cambodia and Germany, all places with infamous records of the mass slaughter of people.
Chinese embassies around the world can also expect protests on August 8 from all kinds of movements, including Darfur campaigners, the free-Tibet voices and the Falungong spiritual group that China has denounced as an "evil cult."
Meanwhile, international rights groups such as Reporters Without Borders and Human Rights Watch plan to release reports during the one-year countdown week.
Even the official Olympic torch relay, which begins in Beijing on March 31 and will last 130 days, is expected to be dogged by protesters as it makes its way around the world.
"When the torch relay moves through places like Paris, London and San Francisco, where there are sizeable Tibetan populations, you can definitely expect Tibetans and Tibetan supporters to mark that," Whitticase said.
He emphasised that various groups were also joining forces in such areas as research and staging protests, pointing out that his Free Tibet Campaign organisation was linking up with Falungong and religious rights activists.
"Groups are coming together to try and maximise the impact of their actions," he said.
Play Fair 2008, a network aiming to improve workers' rights in the global sporting goods industry, put Olympic organisers on the defensive with a report in June that Games merchandise was being made in four Chinese factories using exploitative labour.
Olympic organisers last week terminated their contract with one of the companies.
Tim Noonan, campaign director for the International Trade Union Confederation that is part of the Play Fair movement, described the hosting of the Olympics as a "two-sided coin" for China.
"There was enormous benefit for China's image on the world stage," he said.
"But at the same time it gave enormous openings for groups inside and outside of China to put the spotlight on really serious problems in the way that the Chinese economic and political system is structured."
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