The pressure on Gordon Brown to match words with deeds when it comes to human rights is growing:
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has urged Gordon Brown to boycott this summer’s Olympic opening ceremony in protest at China’s human rights record. He said the prime minister could not attend the event in Beijing “in good conscience”, given the country’s crackdown on protests in Tibet. In a letter, Mr Clegg said Mr Brown must “take a stand for human rights”. The prime minister has ruled out a boycott. The Olympic torch passes through London this weekend. (BBC)
You can read the full letter on the party’s website.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats are ramping up their plans for a strong presence at Sunday’s demonstrations as the Olympic Torch passes through London, with thousands of supporters across London having been text messaged urging them to take part in the protests. It’ll be interesting to see how this use of mobile technology to mobilise protesters works.
Details of the protests (taken from the Liberal Democrat Facebook event) are:
You have three opportunities:
1) to join us in Bloomsbury Square from about 11.45am to collect flags, banners and placards and then to congregate at the junction of Bedford Place and Great Russell Street where the Olympic torch will pass at 12.20pm. This will be part of the wider ‘Free Tibet’ demonstration organised by the Free Tibet Campaign who are supplying some of our equipment.
2) to attend the Tibetan Freedom Torch Rally from 2.15pm to 3.30pm at which NORMAN BAKER MP will speak. It is a rally and cultural event at which the Tibetan Freedom Torch will be lit and traditional and modern Tibetan music played.
3) to join the Southwark Liberal Democrats from about 2.45pm in Potters Field Park (outside City Hall near Tower Bridge) to demonstrate as the Olympic Torch is carried from Tooley Street to City Hall.
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6 Comments
Did we not notice there Human Rights record when we gave them the games? Is there a conversion table? 10 dead protesters = protest against the flame. 20 dead protesters = boycott the opening ceremony. 1000 dead protesters boycott the games?
No there is not a scale…the awarding of the games to China was done by the IOC. I think the time is right to hold the IOC to account for the maintence of its own charter. It was supported politically, some may say naively, in the belife that it would indeed pull China further down the road of progress.
Some may say that was always not going to be the case but the fact is that like it or lump it they have the Games and the question is what we do now about that and how we respond to the actions of the Chinese government that both demonstrates our concern and also engages with the Chinese people. This letter is a good start. I wish i didnt have to work Sunday and could be there because this should be the start of a concerted, broad-based attempt to build a movement that challenges both our own and the Chinese government.
We have plenty of strong areas outside of London, would it have been too hard to book some coaches? If we intend to actually use demonstrations then thats the kind of thing we need to do, not last minute text messaging but a bit more forward planning.
I think we absolutely should, giving the hard left a monopoly on it is bad for everyone, especially when our foreign policy record is far superior.
I agree with Tinter about the coaches, the other possibility is the organising of sympathy events where our presence is strong.
I thought China should have been given the Games because
1. I can’t see how you refuse 25% of the world population if they are technically capbale of delivering them.
2. It would provide a huge spot light, neigh laser beam of scrutiny on the government situation.
3. In advance of the Games the west would have enormous leverage over chinese behaviour because of the possibility of boycott.
Given point 1 I would come on sunday if I lived in London. however i do just wince sometimes at the moral superiority some people take on this this.
I listened to the Clegg interview on Five Live last night in which he was beating Gordon Brown up for not boycotting the opening ceremony. the not very good stand in presenter then reduced him to rubble by asking him the following questions.
Did Nick but Chinese goods? yes. was he calling for a Boycott of these ? No. was he calling for a boycott of the olympics in general? No and he wouldn’t be. So basically the call for an opening ceremony boycott is just a stunt? erm, um etc.
What particularly enjoyed was the answer to why we weren’t originally calling for a boycott of the ceremony? because of the situation in Tibet over the past few months. So the invasion, occupation and cultural genocide from 1949 to 2007 were ok but the last two months were the final straw?
Its all incredibley complex and murkey shades of grey. Its just the sactimony that annoys me.
Anyway I look forward to the demonstrations agaisnt our olympic flame because of Iraq.
I think whether China should have had the Games is a different question entirely although I think we have to question where the ethics wing of the IOC was when this descision was made.
I think the question of whether there should be an economic boycott is a completly irrelevant one because I think it is entirely possible to support the boycott of the Olympic opening ceremony…an economic boycott would lash out at the people of China, staying away from the opening ceremony doesnt…it makes a point. Its not going to bring the CCP crashing to its knees but it is going to send a clear signal that the way it governs its people is not acceptable.
It is not just because of Tibet, it is because that as the recent Amnesty International report pointed out, the Chinese government is using the Games as a pretext to pursue an overt agenda of repression in the name of ‘security’ and a ‘good games’.
Lastly, I find a position of ‘moral superiority’ to be better than one of no morals whatsoever or a relativist one which shrugs its shoulders and says this doesnt matter.