Beijing lobbies on Games

China’s government has begun a quiet lobbying campaign in Washington to deflect threats that the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing will be boycotted because of what critics say is a Chinese failure to help end genocidal violence in Darfur.

The Chinese are leaving no stone unturned to protect their Olympics, which they see as setting the seal on China’s acceptance as a great modern power.

In recent weeks, China has invited members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and activist groups to meetings with high-ranking embassy officials. These gatherings have highlighted the steps China says it has taken to end conflict in
Darfur, where militias backed by the Sudanese government in Khartoum have been charged with war crimes.

{mosads}Larry Rossin, of the Save Darfur coalition, said the invitation to talk with Chinese officials came “from out of the blue.”
“I think they might be afraid of a boycott movement, or anything that might cast a cloud over what is a huge coming-out event for them,” he said.

China is the largest foreign investor in Sudan, and according to Save Darfur, purchases 70 percent of that country’s oil exports. The group has not advocated a boycott of the Beijing Olympics, but has criticized China for blocking stronger
United Nations actions against Khartoum for mass killings in Darfur.

China’s Deputy Embassy Chief Zheng Zeguang closed a private meeting last month with Save Darfur by saying China’s 1.3 billion people are eagerly anticipating the Olympics. He said they would be disappointed and angry with the American people if there were any problems, according to Rossin.

At a separate meeting last week with representatives of several organizations involved in African trade and relief efforts, Zheng outlined the steps China has taken to help Africa and end the Darfur conflict. Zheng spoke in a room that included photographs of Olympic venues in China, and the embassy provided copies of a report, termed a “non-paper,” that said tying Darfur to the Olympics was “ignorant” and “unfair to China.”

These efforts come amid growing pressure on China. Mia Farrow, the actress, who is a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Children’s Fund, has called the 2008 games the “genocide Olympics.” Director Steven Spielberg, an artistic adviser to China on the games, called on Chinese President Hu Jintao to use China’s influence to bring an end to human suffering in Darfur after Farrow wrote Spielberg that he risked becoming the “Leni Riefenstahl” of the games. Riefenstahl filmed the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, along with other Nazi propaganda films.

Zheng also met in late April with Rep. Donald Payne (D-N.J.), a past CBC chairman who heads a House Foreign Relations subcommittee on Africa, according to Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.).  

The meeting with Payne followed a separate meeting six months ago between CBC members and China’s ambassador to the U.S., according to several CBC members. China’s ambassador also began speaking with CBC member and presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on the issue at that time, an embassy official said.

At the initial meeting with China’s ambassador late last year, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said the CBC “asked them to intercede and to help stop the slaughter of the residents of Darfur.”

Cummings told The Hill that China could be doing more in Darfur and that a boycott should not be ruled out. The world “needs to use every means necessary” to bring a resolution to the conflict, he said.

In an e-mailed statement, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) said that by hosting the Olympics, China invites questions about its support for the Sudanese government. “To suggest that somehow it is unfair to ask those questions is ridiculous,” she said. “If China doesn’t like the scrutiny, they can stop tacitly supporting genocide.”

Some Democratic House members outside the CBC also think the U.S. should at least consider a boycott of the Olympic games. House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) called China’s activities in Darfur “despicable” and charged it with aiding and abetting the Sudanese government. He told The Hill it would be “entirely reasonable” to consider a boycott.

But other CBC members are less supportive of talk of a boycott. Rep. Albert Wynn (D-Md.) called it an “interesting thought,” but said China first should be given an opportunity to play a constructive role in Darfur.  

For his part, Rush said he was not prepared to call for a boycott and noted that such a move could hurt Chicago, which has placed a bid to host the Summer Olympics in 2016. The CBC should continue to meet with Chinese officials on Darfur, Rush said, adding that calls for boycotts of the Beijing Olympics would only backfire against the U.S.

In its non-paper, China said calls for a boycott “turn a blind eye toward China’s contribution to the political solution of the Darfur issue.” A boycott would also go against “the universally recognized principle of sports being non-politics” and contravene the Olympic spirit, the non-paper said.

However, Rossin said the linkage between the Olympics and Darfur is inevitable as long as people perceive that China could be doing more to end the conflict.

The Olympics have long been used for political statements. President Jimmy Carter announced the U.S. would boycott the 1980 Olympics in Moscow over the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan, and the Soviets retaliated four years later by leading an Eastern Bloc boycott of the 1984 Olympics hosted by Los Angeles.

Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), who is running for president, introduced in 2005 a resolution calling for the International Olympic Committee to change the venue of the 2008 games. Tancredo’s resolution, however, listed China’s one-child policy and its threat to Taiwan as reasons for moving the Olympics, not Darfur.

In his luncheon address last week, Zheng emphasized that China has replaced Japan as African’s main market for exported goods and listed statistics detailing the scholarships and worker-training programs China provides for Africa.

He also said China is trying to resolve the Darfur conflict by encouraging all sides to sign on to a peace agreement. He insisted China has never been and never will be a “stumbling block” to proposals for resolving the conflict.

But China has been criticized for not pressing Sudan’s government to accept United Nations peacekeepers in Darfur. Rossin said China could be doing more to pressure the Sudanese government to live up to United Nations resolutions and rein in the militias that have killed between 200,000 and 400,000 people.

Rossin also said China should signal that it would support a new U.N. resolution mandating targeted sanctions against Sudan and tell Sudan’s government it will reconsider its investments and trade relations if Sudan does not cooperate with the international community in resolving the Darfur conflict.

Those suggestions run counter to the China non-paper, which states that “relying on pressure or sanction alone would only aggravate the conflict” in Darfur and that the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Sudan should be respected.