After the time of American threats, that of action, then of Chinese threats, the time is now for comments. On Monday, the United States confirmed its choice not to send any American officials to China this winter for official ceremonies, due to human rights violations by China, particularly in the predominantly Muslim region of Xinjiang ( North West).
a “diplomatic boycott” which France says it has “taken good note”, Tuesday, December 7. She also indicated that she was going “coordinate” with the other countries of the European Union on this matter.
“When we have human rights concerns, we tell the Chinese” and “we took sanctions on Xinjiang last March”, underlined the Elysee.
In France, the first political reactions came from the left. As early as Friday, the environmentalist presidential candidate Yannick Jadot claimed in West France a “political boycott by France (neither president, nor ministers) of the Winter Olympics in China and of the world football in Qatar”, judging that France should “stay true to your values, defend human rights“.
On Monday, he repeated it on Twitter: “I once again ask President Emmanuel Macron to boycott the Winter Olympics in China. Persecution of the Uyghurs, repression of the Democrats … It is inadmissible to endorse the instrumentalization of sport by a dictatorship.”
I call on Emmanuel Macron to make a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Olympics. It would be totally inadmissible to participate in the political instrumentalisation of sport by a ferocious dictatorship.# Jadot2022 pic.twitter.com/3ABv66bj3D
– Yannick Jadot (@yjadot) December 7, 2021
His competitor on the left, the Insoumis Jean-Luc Mélenchon, for his part declared himself against a boycott on Twitter: “France must no more boycott the games of # Beijing than those of #Moscow in 1980 or those of Beijing in 2008.”
The Olympics are scheduled for February 4 to 20, but due to restrictions imposed by China on the entry of foreigners in the name of the fight against Covid-19, few world politicians are expected to travel from Beijing. With the notable exception of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who accepted the invitation of his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.