Concerns of China’s human rights abuses have prompted US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call for a diplomatic boycott of next year’s Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Pelosi, a Democrat, told a bipartisan congressional hearing that heads of state around the world should boycott the Winter Olympics, which are to take place in February, according to the BBC.
Athletes would still participate.
Referring to the plight of Uyghur Muslims in China – more than a million Uyghurs and other Muslims in Xinjiang are believed to have been detained – Pelosi said: ‘For heads of state to go to China in light of a genocide that is ongoing … really begs the question, what moral authority do you have to speak again about human rights any place in the world?’
Liu Pengyu, a Chinese embassy spokesman in Washington, dismissed Pelosi’s statements as ‘groundless criticism against China’.
He was quoted as saying: ‘I wonder what makes some US politicians think they actually have the so-called “moral authority”? On human rights issues, they are in no position, either historically or currently, to make wanton groundless criticism against China.’
[Image: Gage Skidmore, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=66638957]