Promises Cynically Broken Over the 2008 Beijing Olympics

Much remains to be done before tens of thousands of athletes, sports enthusiasts and journalists turn up in Beijing for the opening of the Olympic Games on August 8 next year.

Not just all the construction work for a great sporting occasion, but work on human rights, which are still being abused throughout the country on a daily basis.

Despite clear promises China made before it was awarded the Games in 2001, it has done almost nothing to improve human rights. A Chinese official had told the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that if it accepted China's candidacy, "you will be helping the expansion of human rights." But six years later, things are still very bleak.

At least 30 journalists and 50 Internet users are in prison in China, and some have been there since the 1980s. Many have been tortured. They are serving heavy jail sentences for "disclosing state secrets," "subversion" or supposed defamation – after just writing an article or sending an e-mail.

The government blocks access to thousands of Internet news websites and broadcasts in Chinese, Tibetan, and Uighur by a dozen foreign radio stations are jammed.

After removing allegedly dissident messages from online discussion forums, the authorities are now targeting blogs and video-exchange sites. Censors have fitted all the country's blogtools with devices to filter out "subversive" key words. Rules for foreign journalists working in China have been eased but foreign media are still banned from hiring Chinese journalists or traveling freely to Tibet and Xinjiang.

Everyone who loves sport will be shocked to see the Olympic Games and its athletes used by a government that refuses to free thousands of prisoners of conscience and stop the practice of torture and forced labor.

The IOC is meanwhile risking its reputation by saying absolutely nothing about all this. Its charter says that sport must be "at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity."

Nobody wants to spoil the big occasion or use the events for other ends. Except China and its ruling Communist Party, who are abusing the Games and the Olympic spirit.

With just a year to go, it is more urgent than ever to demand that China keep to its pledges. The IOC must act and its president, Jacques Rogge, must speak up. If he does not, the slogan of the 2008 Games, "One world, One dream," will be worthless and be just a cynically broken promise. Athletes, journalists, lovers of sport and everyone who supports human rights must publicly express their concern about the countless violations of freedom in China. So that when the Games open, there will be celebrations all over China, not just in the stadiums.

By Robert Ménard Reporters Without Borders 14 August 2007