Senior Olympic officials denied bowing to Chinese government pressure this week after an influential International Olympic Committee (IOC) body watered down calls for Beijing to find a negotiated solution to the conflict in Tibet.
The controversy emerged as the IOC president, Jacque Rogge, held talks with Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, prompting speculation that the Olympic movement had backed off in deference to Beijing’s sensitivities.
Disquiet over the political fallout from recent violence in Tibet has dominated a meeting of the Olympic movement in China’s capital this week, with the calamitous international torch relay fuelling concern among IOC members.
Tensions emerged publicly as the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), the body that governs the 205 competing nations, included a reference to Tibet in a draft resolution that was to be debated by its members and the IOC executive board on Thursday.
In the final draft released this week, however, the reference to Tibet had been removed, leading to speculation that the IOC had caved in to pressure from Beijing. The original draft urged China to find “a fair and reasonable solution to the internal conflict that affects the Tibet region”.
The statement released this week was milder. In the new wording, ANOC stated “its confidence that the government of the People’s Republic of China shall strive to find, through dialogue and understanding, a fair and reasonable solution to the internal conflict for the benefit of the Games and the athletes”.
Mario Vazquez Rana, the president of ANOC, denied that the organisation had been pressed to make the change and insisted that the redrafted motion did not demonstrate a “lack of independence”. He claimed that ANOC’s lawyers had advised him that by referring to Tibet the IOC risked breaching its oft-stated position of not interfering in national politics.
The embarrassing episode comes as the IOC and its president face increasing international pressure over its accommodation with China as Olympic hosts. The torch relay has been a PR disaster for China and the IOC, with significant numbers of protesters in London, Paris and San Francisco turning out in defiance of IOC claims that the torch is not a political symbol.
Beijing is determined to press ahead despite the disastrous reception the torch has received so far. The IOC is to review the policy of staging international relays.
The IOC would not comment on the substance of Rogge’s discussions with the Chinese prime minister and he is unlikely to have raised the issue of Tibet directly with his hosts. In an interview with Belgian television this week, Rogge said such a move would be counter-productive. “If you know China, you know that mounting the barricades and using tough language will have the opposite effect. China will close itself off from the rest of the world, which, don’t forget, it has done for some 2 000 years.” — Â