Dear Roger Federer, Please Boycott Beijing 20082 min read

Bernard-Henri Lévy, veteran of the French left, in the Spanish centre-right paper El Mundo, called for a boycott of the games to “save sport, honour and many lives”. Of Chinese attacks on Tibetan dissidents, he wrote: “In front of this cynicism I think that there is still time to make use of tough language.” He added: “Will Beijing never cede? Will a boycott never work? We will never know unless we try.”

[via rebel-art]

meanwhile closer to home, sonntagszeitung yesterday reported how china is trying to extend their media censorship to switzerland. DJ and tibet activist pablo lobsang was being interviewed in front of the chinese consulate for local tv station TeleBärn, when someone charged out to interrupt the interview, and shortly after the police arrived to stop the filming.

Makenoize 4 Tibet

Reporters Without Borders calls on the National Olympic Committees, the IOC, athletes, sports lovers and human rights activists to publicly express their concern about the countless violations of every fundamental freedom in China.

After Beijing was awarded the games in 2001, Harry Wu, a Chinese dissident who spent 19 years in prisons in China, said he deeply regretted that China did not have “the honour and satisfaction of hosting the Olympic Games in a democratic country.”

sign this petition

This site is dedicated to the debate about whether the 27 EU countries should take note of numerous reports about China’s human rights record – and boycott the Beijing Olympic Games, which are scheduled to begin on August 8 2008. It is sponsored by those who want a genuine debate about a boycott.

1. The human rights crackdown arising from the organisation of the Olympics goes against the very spirit of Olympism

2. In spite of explicit promises made prior to the awarding of the Games by the Chinese regime to improve the human rights, the situation has deteriorated

3. Freedoms of expression and information have worsened – journalists are being prevented from reporting the reality of what is happening in China

4. Heightened crackdown on all religious freedoms in Tibet and in mainland China

5. Genocide is currently taking place in China with the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, in Tibet and in Darfur

6. Families are being forcibly removed from their homes for the construction of the Olympic village, with no offer of compensation