A recent scandal has been sweeping across China concerning the coming 2022 Winter Olympics, the hosting country’s vice premier Zhang Gaoli who is the face of China’s organizing efforts ahead of the said event, has now found himself at the centre of an explosive #MeToo scandal that had the world calling for a boycott of the Games, what happened is that the vice premier was accused earlier this month by Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai of sexual assault, her original post sent shock waves through Chinese social media, and was deleted within 30 minutes, since then, Chinese censors have been diligently scrubbing her name and even the vaguest references to her allegations from the internet, but as weeks went by, concerns regarding the tennis champion grew as she hasn’t made a public appearance ever since her accusations, even the women’s tennis world organization began to demand answers as to Peng’s whereabouts but, amid growing global concern about her safety and well-being, soon arrived the prompt Chinese response, as a matter of fact, individuals working forChinese government-controlled media and the state sports system released a stream of “proof of life” photos and videos of Peng carefully avoiding any mention of Peng’s sexual assault allegations.
When It comes to the accused, Zhang has remained completely outside of public view, and he has not issued any response to the accusation, he has kept a low profile and faded from public life.
Now, the ball is in the court of the international sports community whether they’ll be satisfied by the “proof of life” videos of Peng, or if they will continue to press for a full investigation into her allegations, as a matter of fact, The Women’s Tennis Association announced all tournaments in China would be suspended in light of concerns about the safety of Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai, the said announcement was seconded by the United States, and Australian politicians on both sides who have called for a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Winter Olympics in Beijing in light of the scandal, later that week, the UK said it would consider whether to impose its own boycott or not and even Canada’s foreign ministry said it “remains deeply disturbed by the troubling reports of human rights violations in China” and is continuing to discuss the matter “with our partners and allies.”
As for Zhang, it’s likely he would never have expected that after committing much of the final years of his career to preparations for the Winter Olympics, allegations against him would one-day fuel growing calls for a boycott of the Games.
Moreover, this was just one of the reasons for the American-led boycott though since the IOC choice was sharply criticized at the time by human rights groups, which noted that the 2008 Olympics had not improved rights’ conditions in China, in addition, the decision was broadly welcomed by rights groups and politicians in the US needless to say that President Biden has been under pressure to speak out against Chinese actions.
Regarding US-China relations, they definitely plummeted with Biden’s predecessor Donald Trump and his war against the Chinese empire and the incendiary debate over how the Covid-19 virus first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan, on the other hand, the current president has been trying to re-engage with Beijing due to its ever-growing economic power and military presence across the Indo-Pacific region.
For what concerns the scandal, The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said that it respected the US government’s decision and in responding to that, Omer Kanat, executive director of the Uyghur Human Rights Project said, “The Chinese government is using the 2022 Winter Games as a showcase for its world leadership. A diplomatic boycott sends a strong signal: governments refuse to give a green light to the Uyghur genocide.”
The World Uyghur Congress also lauded the decision, adding “we continue to urge governments around the world to take further bilateral and multilateral action.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/6/us-announces-diplomatic-boycott-of-2022-beijing-olympics
https://www.cbc.ca/sports/olympics/how-beijing-landed-2022-winter-olympics-1.6276079
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/11/25/china/who-is-zhang-gaoli-intl-hnk-dst/index.html
By The European Institute for International Law and International Relations.
