US planning diplomatic boycott of Beijing Olympics 2022 over human rights abuses: Report

As Beijing’s Olympics 2022 is just three months away, the Biden administration is reportedly planning to boycott the games and will not send an official delegation to China in defiance to the Olympics over China’s human rights abuses, reported  the Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin, who extensively covers China policy, on Tuesday, 16 November. As per the analyst, US President Joe Biden has been given a formal recommendation for a diplomatic boycott of the Olympics that is due to begin in February 2022. While the US athletes will take part in the Beijing Olympics as normal, the official delegation from the United States as well as the state politicians will not reportedly attend the games ceremony. 

“We don’t have any official update on the US position,” the deputy White House spokesman, Andrew Bates told WaPo, the Guardian newspaper reported on 16 November. Furthermore, the official stated that the Olympics had not been a matter of discussion at the recent Biden-Xi summit. 

Meanwhile, the US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan told a Brookings Institution video conference that President Biden “is always going to be Joe Biden. He is going to be direct and straightforward. And he’s not going to sand down the edges of direct messages on hard issues.” 

Dems, Republicans push Biden to lodge Beijing Olympics 2022 disapproval

The Biden administration’s decision to boycott Olympics 2022 organised by China comes amid mounting pressure from both Democrats and Republicans who lodged a strong protest against the Olympics 2022 games, asking the Biden administration to convey a message of disapproval to the Xi Jinping government. The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan also accused China of infringing the freedom for the civilians in Hong Kong, and human rights abuses by launching a political crackdown on the pro-democracy groups. The Biden administration also plans to inform its allies and partners of its boycott, The Guardian reported, quoting the source.  

“President Biden raised concerns about the [People’s Republic of China’s] practices in Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong, as well as human rights more broadly,” a White House readout from Chinese President Xi Jinping and Biden’s meeting read. 

Experts have also raised questions over the United States' delay in boycotting the Olympics 2022 in China, as an analyst, Michael Mazza from the American Enterprise Institute stated that the push to halt the games must have come much earlier. “We’re now faced with suboptimal options. The one the White House settled on may make us feel good about ourselves, but it shouldn’t. A diplomatic boycott will do little to actually help Uyghurs and other victims of abuses,” The Guardian quoted Mazza as saying. 

The latter also appealed to the US to send a delegation to China to highlight the plight of the Uyghurs and “talk every day to the press about what they were seeing.” The White House is also expected to make an official announcement this week that neither President Biden nor any other US official will attend the Beijing Olympics, and the decision will be approved by the end of this month, an administrative source told Washington Post. 

Xi planned to invite Biden to Olympics

It was reported earlier that at the virtual summit between the two countries' leaders, Chinese President Xi Jinping had planned to give a personal invitation to US President Biden to attend the Olympics games in Beijing in February 2022. Furthermore, the G-7 nations at the time were also discussing a “diplomatic boycott” of the games over China’s Uyghur genocide. While a joint decision on the government officials' attendance at the Olympics games 2022 is yet to be made, the athletes for the G7 nations will participate in the games, at least two Western diplomat sources told the paper.