Countdown clock reaches 100 days in politically charged Beijing Olympics

The Associated Press

Published: April 29, 2008

BEIJING : With 100 days to go, the battle has been lost to keep politics out of the Beijing Olympics.

Shimmering venues and billions spent to remake Beijing into a modern city have been dulled by pro-Tibet protests, chaos on the torch relay and an anti-Western backlash by angry Chinese who sense their coming-out party is being spoiled.

A year ago former International Olympic Committee president Juan Antonio Samaranch predicted Beijing would be the "best in Olympics history." A few weeks ago his successor Jacques Rogge said the games were "in crisis."

The shine is off, and the question is this: Can China's communist government and the IOC return some luster by squeezing sports and goodwill back into the games? The Olympics have been visited by politics before — Berlin '36, Mexico City '68, Munich '72 to name a few — but these are the most contentious since the boycotted 1980 Moscow Olympics.

"The Chinese leadership has a major international public relations problem on its hands," said David L. Shambaugh, a political scientist and director of the China policy program at George Washington University.

"The Chinese government and citizenry are now involved in fighting a propaganda war with the West and the Western media in particular," Shambaugh said. "This stance, taken together with hyper Chinese nationalism, has all the makings of a public relations disaster for the Olympic Games."

There's a rancorous atmosphere in Beijing these days.

Deadly riots in Tibet last month spurred anti-Chinese government protests in several cities of the torch relay, forcing the last-minute rerouting of many legs. In Pakistan, India and other countries, organizers shortened routes, tightened security, and turned the relay into invitation-only events that kept out the general public."

The coverage has been met with a propaganda war by China's state-run media, accusing the Western media of orchestrated bias — particularly CNN and the British Broadcasting Corp.

There have been nasty outbreaks of Chinese nationalism, fueled by the attack on a young Chinese woman in a wheelchair who defended the Olympic torch during the Paris leg. Claiming an insult to national pride, protesters have gathered outside the French retailer Carrefour in a dozen Chinese cities with scuffles erupting between Chinese and foreigners.

The Beijing Olympics were political from the moment seven years ago when the IOC chose the one-party state. These are not just Beijing Olympics, but China's Olympics and unprecedented spending on every phase has been aimed at showcasing the country's growing economic and political power.

There's time to rescue the games, but Beijing must get lucky.

A tiny turnaround may begin with several low-key events Wednesday to mark 100 days: a mini-marathon race around the two iconic Olympic venues — the new National Stadium known as the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube where the swimming and diving will be held — and the finals of a four-year contest to pick official Olympic songs.

This week's arrival of the torch to mainland China could signal the worst is over, with the domestic portion of the relay likely to have few pro-Tibet protesters. English-speaking Chinese volunteers may also soften the edge. At test venues, they've swarmed foreign reporters, helping with translation, or simply stood at attention wearing yellow, smiley face buttons.

A draconian plan should temporarily rid the city of its noxious air, the most menacing problem until deadly rioting broke out on March 14 in Tibet. Beijing's nightlife might also help. Even a doping scandal — as long as Chinese aren't involved — could distract from politics.

"I believe the image of China's Olympics is still good," said Jin Yuanpu, a political scientist and executive director of the Humanistic Olympic Center at Renmin University in Beijing. "It's just the Western media and some Westerners who are taking this opportunity to attack us. Chinese are trying their best to be a good host."

Of course, potential flash points loom.

Despite security clampdowns and tightened visa restrictions to keep out troublesome foreigners, disruptions could occur during the torch relay in mainland China, particularly in Tibet or the western region of Xinjiang. Any partial boycott of the opening ceremony — a response to the crackdown in Tibet — would stir more anti-Western sentiment.

Protests during the games against Chinese policies in Tibet and Darfur could attract wide coverage by 30,000 journalists, and any heavy-handed policing would be flashed on TV worldwide. High-profile Olympic sponsors such as Coca-Cola, General Electric and Volkswagen could be dragged in and sullied if their logos wind up in the midst of a protest.

A few weeks ago in Beijing, Rogge said with the exception of venues "there is absolutely no problem for an athlete to express his or her views" at the games. He spoke just days after a dissident Hu Jia was sent to prison for inciting "to subvert state power." His charges weren't linked to the Olympics, but he had been critical of the games and published an essay called "The Real China and the Olympics."

China and the IOC have always said the games are about sports, not politics. However, at a news conference earlier this month with top-ranking IOC officials, the first comment from Wang Wei, the executive vice president and general secretary of the Beijing organizing committee, was a long defense of China's Tibet policy.

Wang sat alongside IOC member Hein Verbruggen, who gave an impassioned defense of the IOC, saying it should avoid taking sides on political issues.

At several sports venues during test events, politics were on the table. A 180-page government-published book in English was available to reporters explaining Chinese foreign policy, defense policy, religious freedom and human rights.

"The Chinese are not prepared for the kind of press freedom that happens at every Olympics and produces insult and bad feelings," said John MacAloon, an Olympic historian at the University of Chicago. "Everything that gets written will be instantly fed back to the students and the Internet community in Beijing. I'm at least as worried about student protests over these perceived insults against China as I am about anything the state is going to do."

A year ago, a state-published magazine wrote that "Chinese security experts expect no serious problems" for the Olympics. Now government officials are warning terrorism is the biggest threat and they've been promised cooperation from Interpol to thwart any attack.

A several-year effort by the IOC to bring in foreign experts to run game venues has been rebuffed, leaving hollow the game's slogan: "One World, One Dream." Two months ago Beijing organizers announced that all 28 competition managers would be Chinese nationals who are more likely to listen to the dictates of Chinese officials over the objections of the IOC or others.

"To me these games remain a mystery that could go various ways," said David Wallechinsky, an Olympic historian who has covered 12 Olympics and opposed choosing Beijing. He's the author of the "The Complete Book of the Summer Olympics."

"I thought it was a big mistake. I'm not surprised it's going the way it's going. I don't think it's going to change China, or at least the control of the Chinese Communist Party," he said. "The main result is that it's a black eye for the Olympics, and an unnecessary black eye."