Beijing 2008 Olympics Campaign
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The Athens 2004 Olympics, and subsequent passing of the Olympic flag from Greece to China, signaled the beginning of an international campaign to use the 2008 Beijing Olympics to shine a spotlight on China's occupation of Tibet. Since the International Olympic Committee (IOC) awarded Beijing the 2008 Olympic Games in 2001, China's human rights record has deteriorated. China executes more people than the rest of the world put together; Amnesty International monitored 1,060 cases in 2003 alone. 2003 also witnessed the first execution in nearly two decades of a Tibetan political prisoner, Lobsang Dhondup. In Tibet, religious freedom and Tibetan culture continue to be eroded and Tibetans are routinely denied the right to express their political views.

The Beijing Olympics are integral to the Chinese government's increasingly sophisticated effort to obscure its occupation of Tibet and human rights record from international scrutiny. The IOC and China's leaders insist that politics must not be allowed to sully the Olympics, but China's bid was nothing if not political. By voting to hold the 2008 Olympic games in China the IOC gave international legitimacy to Beijing's authoritarian rule and its brutal military occupation of Tibet. The Olympics will provide a major opportunity for the Chinese government to showcase itself to the world as a legitimate, respectable, political power. We will shift the focus to highlight the realities of the Chinese government: the occupation of Tibet and deplorable human rights abuses.

You can find further information at www.2008-freetibet.org, and read the following reports about Tibet, human rights, and Beijing 2008.

2004 Report

2001 Report: Should Beijing Be Host to the 2008 Olympic Games?