Here’s a shocker:
With the 2008 Olympic Games due to open in the shining Bird’s Nest Stadium on Aug. 8, [Amnesty International] on Tuesday gave a scathing assessment of China’s record, saying many of its citizens’ protections and freedoms have shrunk, not expanded, in the seven years since Beijing won the right to hold the Games.
The country has not honored vows to improve rights that officials made in lobbying for the Games, and was not living up to commitments as an Olympic host, the group stated in the report released in Hong Kong.
“There has been no progress towards fulfilling these promises, only continued deterioration,” it said in the report, titled “The Olympics countdown — broken promises.”
“The authorities have used the Olympic Games as pretext to continue, and in some respects, intensify existing policies and practices which have led to serious and widespread violations of human rights,” it said in the report released in Hong Kong.
Amnesty said that in the past year alone, thousands of petitioners, reformists and others were arrested as part of a government campaign to “clean up” Beijing before the games. It said many of those arrested have been sentenced to manual labor without trial.
And then there’s this related item:
Some International Olympic Committee officials cut a deal to let China block sensitive Web sites despite promises of unrestricted access, a senior IOC official admitted on Wednesday. . .
China had committed to providing media with the same freedom to report on the Games as they enjoyed at previous Olympics, but journalists have this week complained of finding access to sites deemed sensitive to its communist leadership blocked. . .
China has backed away from a promise to lift all Internet blocks on foreign media. . . Chinese officials assured news organizations “complete freedom to report” when bidding for the games seven years ago. The International Olympic Committee received further such assurances in April. But Kevan Gosper, a senior member of the IOC, said this week that the promise will apply only to sites related to “Olympic competitions.”
Internet Scofflaw 