Beginning February 4th and continuing until February 20th, the 2022 Winter Olympics Games are being hosted by Beijing China, despite their horrific human and animal rights violations.
The United States, Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan and Lithuania have issued a diplomatic boycott.
Originally Lithuania had released a statement that it would remain politically neutral and confirmed that the committee had no plans to boycott the games. However, on December 3rd, 2021 they were the first nation to announce a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics.
On Monday, December 6th, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the US would not contribute to the "fanfare" of the Olympics. She said not sending an official delegation to the 2022 Games "could send a clear message". "US diplomatic or official representation would treat these games as business as usual in the face of... egregious human rights abuses and atrocities in Xinjiang," she said. "We simply can't do that."
In the BBC’s December 7th article, titled 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics: China criticises US diplomatic boycott, Foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian was quoted that China would take "resolute counter-measures" but did not give further details.(https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59559703)
And an article written by the BBC on December 8th, 2021 states that China has condemned the US for their stance and further indicates that they have threatened retaliation. (UK and Canada join diplomatic boycott of China Winter Olympics https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-59582137)
And on Chinese social media platform Weibo, the search topic "US diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics" was censored as of December 7th.
However, despite the diplomatic boycott and the threats of retaliation by the Chinese Government the US, Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan and Lithuania have all still sent their athletes to compete in this years games with full government support. And Ms Psaki added the US government did not feel it was right "to penalise athletes who had been training for this moment”.(2022 Beijing Winter Olympics: China criticises US diplomatic boycott https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59559703)
The Official Suppliers, Partners and Supporters for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics are:
Official Suppliers:
FASKEN, PILLITTER, ROCK-IT GLOBAL, STORAGE VAULT
The Canadian Media Partners are:
CBC, Quebecor Media and The Globe and Mail
Worldwide Partners include:
Coca-Cola, AirBnb, Alibaba Group, Atos, Bridgestone, Intel, Omega, Panasonic, P&G, Samsung and Visa
Partners:
RBC, Bell, Canadian Tire and Lululemon
National Partners:
Cadillac Fairview, Deloitte, Petro Canada, Teck and Toyota
Official Supporters are:
Air Canada, ATPI Sports Events, General Mills, KraftHeinz, LifeWorks, Molson Canadian, Christie, Cadbury, Skip, Smith School of Business/Queens University and Sobeys
The Swiss watchmaker Omega SA the official timekeeper of the Games has not been quiet about their involvement or support for this years Olympics. As they have once again launched a new watch, marking the Beijing Olympic Games. Omega said that is committed to supporting Olympic sports and doesn’t get involved in certain political issues.
However, in contrast, due to the human rights violations in Xinjiang Visa, P&G and Coca Cola are keeping relatively low profiles.
It has been reported that the top sponsors are fearful of retaliation by the Chinese government and 1.4 billion citizens due to the diplomatic boycott led by the United States.
However, the conflicting information being provided about the athlete’s right to compete overshadows the message of the diplomatic boycott.
By participating in this years games they are stating that sports, competition and the feelings of the athletes are more important than the crimes being committed.
And these companies are more worried about their payouts to the IOC and the potential backlash they may face from China than the horrific atrocities that are being inflicted on the Uyghurs and innocent animals in the meat trade.
With as many as 30 million dogs a year suffering for the dog meat trade across Asia and an estimated 10 million dogs and 4 million cats murdered across China every year.
We cannot remain silent!
We need to raise our voices even louder and assist the organizations working to rescue these animals and stop this horrific industry.
Please take a stand and refuse to watch, purchase or participate in anything associated with this years Winter Olympics.
And after the Olympics are over keep reminding these companies there are financial consequences for choosing greed over life.
We must let them know, that their compliance with these atrocities will not be accepted and they will financially suffer for supporting the massacre of these innocent animals.
****Please SHARE our petition to STOP the Yulin Festival & END the dog and cat meat trade: http://chng.it/VTnw879Mgr