Olympic ceremony boycott a "cop out": White House (national security adviser Stephen Hadley)

Reuters on Yahoo ^ | 4/13/08 | Randall Mikkelsen - ap

[NormsRevenge]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A boycott of Olympic ceremonies by world leaders over China's crackdown in Tibet would be an evasion of responsibility and less effective than quiet diplomacy, the U.S. national security adviser said on Sunday.

The remarks by White House adviser Stephen Hadley come as a challenge to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has said she will not attend the opening ceremony of this year's Beijing Olympics, and to those calling for President George W. Bush and other leaders to do the same.

"I think unfortunately a lot of countries say 'well, if we say we are not going to the opening ceremonies, we've checked the box on Tibet' -- that's a cop out," Hadley said on "Fox News Sunday."

"If other countries are concerned about Tibet they ought to do what we are doing, through quiet diplomacy," he said. "They would put pressure on Chinese authorities, quietly, to meet with representatives of the (exiled Tibetan spiritual leader) Dalai Lama and use this as an opportunity to help resolve this situation."

Bush has said he plans to go to the Olympic Games in August, although the White House has not said whether he will attend the opening ceremonies. Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and Republican candidate John McCain have said Bush should consider an opening-ceremony boycott.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has indicated he may not attend, and the European Parliament has passed a resolution calling for European Union leaders to consider boycotting the ceremony due to the crackdown in Tibet.

Dissatisfaction with the level of China's pressure on Sudan to end violence in the Darfur region has also fueled calls to boycott the opening ceremony.

U.S. speedskating gold medalist Joey Cheek, who co-founded the Team Darfur international athlete's coalition, said on Fox that the sort of quiet diplomacy favored by the Bush administration has not worked in Darfur.

"They've been using quiet diplomacy for the last two years, as tens of thousands of more people have been killed," he said.

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who led a 54-nation boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, said on ABC's "This Week" that he did not endorse a boycott of this year's games.

"That was a totally different experience in 1980, when the Soviet Union had brutally invaded and killed thousands and thousands of people," Carter said.

"They were threatening to go further south and take over other countries."

[goldstategop]

The Olympics IS a political event and Stephen Hadley doesn't get it. The President's attendance in Beijing would be an endorsement of the regime's repression of its own people. That would be the wrong message to send to China.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Tai_Chung]

President Bush should go to the Olympics in Beijing. The Dalai Lama should be his personal guest.

[cherry]

the big stink should have been when China was in the running for the Olympics....now, its just a little too late in the game to be crying about it....

so all these years, if reports are true and I believe they are true, that female unborn children have been selectively slaugherted, BORN female children killed or left uncared for....political prisoners used as organ donors, and CHristians in general abused and harassed....

I am all for Tibet and whatever religion the Dali Lami is preaching...let him and his followers be....but why is his cause anymore boycott worthy than the infanticide going on for ages?

[edcoil]

Quiet diplomacy has worked so well don’t ya think.

[NormsRevenge]

Oh Yes,, and while we’re at it, Let’s double Foreign Aid and the budgets of the UN and IOC too.. something has to stick .. eventually

[Forward the Light Brigade]

The president should go and wear a flag pin on his lapel—the flag of free Tibet.

[mathurine]

I don’t get too worked up about Tibet, the Dalai Lama, and how they and the Chinese work things out. As far as I know, Tibet has been under China’s thumb most recently since about 1950, and most of the time for the last six or seven hundred years it has been either governed as part of China or governed as a feudal dependency of China. Tibet has never been a big deal in geopolitics. Even when China was a much weaker state, there was no country which would have tried to intervene, considering how difficult it would be, and how little payoff there would be for the effort, if by some unimaginable stroke of luck it were successful. In the real world there is the problem of North Korea where the help of China is quite important; there is Taiwan, where China’s incursions could cause some real concern and international havoc; there are a variety of serious matters which require fairly continuous negotiations with China.

The awarding of the Olympics to China was panglossian, at best, but it was done. Live with it. Besides, the TV contracts for the Olympics are already let, the ads are being sold, and the show must go on, even if the javelin throwing is changed from an individual sport to a competetive team sport.

[em2vn]

Another “W” second rater speaking up. Did Madelyne Albright redux order him to do so?

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

Bush’s stupidity continues.

Nine more months left.

We will then inherit someone even more dangerous among those three. But there is also a possibility McCain will drop dead before that…And no, I am not apologizing for my statement. I am being realistic. My country first.

[BfloGuy]

I just can't get worked up over this flap. I heard Laura Ingraham trying to turn this into another crusade à la illegal immigration and I don't get it. Yes, I hate communists, but the Chinese people are a hell of a lot better off than they were 20 years ago.

Capitalism is doing its job and boycotting the Olympics will just set things back by convincing the Chinese people we don't respect them. Their government can use that sentiment to cause all sorts of mischief.

[puppypusher]

The White house can refuse to boycott the Olympic Games but I know One thing, and that is my T.V. will be tuned to something else.

If the Big three Over the air broadcast networks wish to cover it thats their business.

I won't be watching.

[TigersEye]

...most of the time for the last six or seven hundred years it has been either governed as part of China or governed as a feudal dependency of China.

FWIW your history is incorrect. In fact just the opposite is true.

History of Tibet

Chinese and "proto-Tibeto-Burman" may have split sometime before 4000 BC, when the Chinese began growing millet in the Yellow River valley while the Tibeto-Burmans remained nomads; Tibet split from Burma circa 500.

Tibet appeared in an ancient Chinese historical text, where it is referred to as Fa. The first externally confirmed incident in recorded Tibetan history occurred when King Namri Löntsän (Gnam-ri-slon-rtsan) sent an ambassador to China in the early 7th century.

This event marks the incorporation of Tibet into China, according to modern Chinese historians.[citation needed] Pro-Tibetan historians argue that China and Tibet remained two separate units within the Mongol Empire.[citation needed] It may be more accurate, however, to characterize this as both China and Tibet being incorporated into the Mongol Empire, which became known as the Yuan Dynasty. During the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongolians conquered China. In a delicate balance aimed at ruling both territories while preserving Mongol identity, Khubilai prohibited Mongols from marrying Chinese, but left both the Chinese and Tibetan legal and administrative systems intact.[43] Tibet never adopted the Chinese system of exams nor Neo-Confucian policies.

[purpleraine]

The selection of an Olympic city is a several year event preceded by a campaign and bribes to the committee.

If certain countries are unacceptable to us it would seem the best thing to do is say, if so and so gets the nod we won't be there; not wait until the games are a few months away and then boycott. Is China worse today than last year?There has been no change or deterioration over the usual crap in China to warrant a last-minute call for a boycott. It's just grandstanding.

[purpleraine]

Second option is to say, OK China got the games, but if they're still doing so and so 6 months before hand, we're not coming.