The Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau has disclosed that the nation will launch a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing.
According to the PM, no federal government officials will attend the games. Canadian athletes will still be allowed to compete.
Recall that the U.S., U.K. and Australia already have announced they won’t send official delegations to the games — a collective attempt to send a message to China that its human rights abuses have not gone unnoticed.
The PM, while speaking to reporters on Parliament Hill, said the government is “extremely concerned” by the “repeated human rights violations carried out by the Chinese government.”
Trudeau stated that Canada will show its displeasure with the communist regime by withholding the delegates that normally would attend high-profile events like the opening and closing ceremonies.
When asked if he was anticipating any blowback from Beijing for snubbing China as it prepares to host the world, he said “this should not come as a surprise” to the regime.
The PM said “For months, we have been coordinating and discussing the issue with our allies”.
It should be noted that MPs, senators and civil society groups have been pushing the Trudeau government to hold China accountable for its crackdown on democratic rights in Hong Kong and the ongoing abuse of the Uyghur Muslim minority.
Recall that earlier this year; the House of Commons passed a motion branding the violence directed at religious minorities in China’s Xinjiang province as “genocide.” That motion followed a Commons subcommittee report that found China persecutes its Muslim minority through mass detention in concentration camps, forced labour, state surveillance and population control measures — policies the report said are designed to “eradicate Uyghur culture and religion.”
In the motion, MPs also called on the federal government to use its influence to pressure the International Olympic Committee to move the games out of China “if the Chinese government continues this genocide.”
In his reaction, Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole said his party’s push to relocate the games got “no traction with Mr. Trudeau” and a diplomatic boycott is the next best thing.
Though he’s horrified by reports of violence in Xinjiang, O’Toole said a full boycott would be unfair to Canada’s Olympic and Paralympic athletes who have trained so hard for the world’s premier sporting event.
While agreeing that Olympic athletes shouldn’t pay a price for China’s abuses, Trudeau said “They need to have one thing in mind and that’s representing the country to the best of their ability and winning a gold medal for Canada”.
The Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) in a statement said it “understands and respects” the government’s decision and applauds the effort to “draw an important distinction between the participation of athletes and the participation of government officials.”
Records have it that the last time Canada pursued a full boycott of the Olympics was in 1980, when the federal government blocked athletes from participating in the summer games in Moscow to protest the Soviet Union’s military presence in Afghanistan.
