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IOC Rejects Tibet's Beijing Games Participation

Lausanne, Switzerland, 10/12/07 - Reuters (Karolos Grohmann) - The International Olympic Committee on Monday rejected a Tibetan request to field a team for next year's Beijing Olympics, as some 100 Tibetans and supporters demonstrated outside the IOC headquarters.

"The IOC is not in a position to accept our application," Wangpo Tethong, chairman of the unofficial Tibetan National Olympic Committee, told reporters after a brief meeting with IOC administrators. "Of course we are disappointed that our athletes will not participate," he said.

Tibet has been ruled by China with an iron fist since 1950 when Communist troops invaded.

http://sport.guardian.co.uk/breakingnews/feedstory/0,,-7140600,00.html

Olympic Committee can bring positive change in China

London, 10/12/07 - The Executive Board of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) begins meeting today in Switzerland. Amnesty International urges the IOC to ensure that human rights concerns are addressed in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics.

China will host the games next year and the Beijing Olympics offer an opportunity for a positive human rights legacy for the country. Specifically, progress on the death penalty, detention without trial, freedom of expression and the protection of human rights activists, would contribute to such a legacy.

Human rights reforms are the primary responsibility of the Chinese authorities, but Amnesty International believes that the IOC can still make a significant contribution by using its influence to bring about positive change. According to the Olympic Charter, the IOC has a role in promoting a positive Olympic legacy for the cities and countries hosting the Games.

http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/news/olympic-committee-can-bring-positive-change-china-20071209

IOC rebuffs Tibetan request for own team at Beijing Olympics

Lausanne, 10/12/07 - (AP) - The International Olympic Committee has rejected an attempt by Tibet to field its own team at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. More than 100 Tibet supporters - including some Buddhist monks - waved banners and Tibetan flags outside the IOC headquarters Monday, as delegates from the unofficial Tibetan National Olympic Committee met with the organization's officials to discuss the request.

"The IOC is not in a position to accept our application," said Wangpo Tethong, a president of the Tibetan group. Michel Filliau, a senior IOC official who took part in the meeting, said a rule change in 1996 meant only national committees from countries recognized by the international community can take part in the Olympics. A special exemption is granted to those territories whose national committees were recognized before 1996, said Filliau, who directs the IOC's relations with national committees.

The Palestinian territories, Hong Kong and Taiwan - which competes as "Chinese Taipei" - are among those that benefit from the exemption.

The possibility of a Tibetan participating as an "independent Olympic athlete" also won't happen, an IOC spokeswoman said. "In this particular case, athletes from the region would fall under the National Olympic Committee of China," Giselle Davies said. Beijing dismissed outright the request from Tibet, which has been controlled by China since 1951. "Tibet is part of China's territory," the Beijing organizing committee said Monday in a statement. "The possibility of participating in the Beijing Olympics as a separate group does not exist."

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/2007-12-10-2739291831_x.htm

Tibetans activists rally at IOC headquarters

Lausanne, 10/12/07 - (NBC) - Monday morning here by the shores of Lake Geneva showed up dreary, rainy and cold. Undeterred, several dozen Tibetan activists showed up across the street from International Olympic Committee headquarters to blow horns, wave flags and lobby the IOC for the impossible, the admission of Tibet as a recognized national Olympic committee at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

At the risk of repetition but to be as clear and direct as possible, athletes representing an entity called "Tibet" are not going to march in the parade of nations next August at Olympic Stadium in Beijing.

Even so, the rally Monday underscores the intricate arrangements that have, as of now, divvied up the world into 205 "national Olympic committees" even as it illuminates the increasingly media- and internet-savvy strategies now in use in campaigns to leverage the onset of a Games, in particular the Beijing Olympics, for political effect.

It would be tempting, for instance, to dismiss the rally Monday outside the IOC headquarters, the Chateau de Vidy, as just one more PR stunt.

Except that sensitivities on the matter are so keen that the Beijing 2008 organizing committee, seven time zones ahead, felt compelled -- even before the activisits had departed the scene in Lausanne -- to issue a statement to the Associated Press that declared, "Tibet is part of China's territory. The possibility of participating in the Beijing Olympics as a separate group does not exist."

http://universalsports.nbcsports.com/articles/show/35062?sport_id=0