US Jewish leaders urge Olympic boycott
By Michal Lando, THE JERUSALEM POST
On the eve of Holocaust Remembrance Day, US Jewish leaders from across the spectrum are urging Jews to boycott the summer Olympics in Beijing to protest China's human rights record and its assistance to Iran, Syria and Hamas.
A total of 185 rabbis and Jewish leaders so far have signed on to the appeal, which claims that China, like Germany in 1936, is using the Olympics to deflect attention from its record.
"We are deeply troubled by China's support for the genocidal government of Sudan; its mistreatment of the people of Tibet; its denial of basic rights to its own citizens; and its provision of missiles to Iran and Syria, and friendship for Hamas," the text of a joint statement read. "Having endured the bitter experience of abandonment by our presumed allies during the Holocaust, we feel a particular obligation to speak out against injustice and persecution today."
Spearheading the project is Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, a former chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, and Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, head of New York's Kehilath Jeshurun synagogue and the Ramaz School. It is based partially on research by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies.
The appeal seizes on the creation of a kosher kitchen at the Olympics village to attract Jewish tourists as part of a larger strategy to deflect attention from China's human rights record.
"Jews should not be party to the whitewashing of such a regime," the statement read.
Several representatives of Judaism's major denominations and institutions are signatories, including Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism; Neil Goldstein and Richard Gordon of the American Jewish Congress; and Rabbi Joel Meyers, executive vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, the association of Conservative rabbis.
Lookstein said the call for a boycott is limited to the Olympics and is not intended toward all dealings with China.
"I don't think there is anything wrong with people doing business with China, but the Olympics is not business, it is fun and pleasure," Lookstein said.
"They should not be able to be the center for the world's most famous sporting event, and Jews should be sensitive to that.
"I don't think people should spend their discretionary time or funds in support of an activity which serves to give legitimacy to a government which is doing some terrible things," added Lookstein.
"Are they analogous to the Nazis? No. But if they told Sudanese to stop genocide in Darfur, it would stop in a dime," he said. "Instead they are standing by while innocent blood is being shed."
Organizers of the petition say there is a lesson to be learned from the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. Shortly after the Berlin games, President Franklin D. Roosevelt told American Jewish leaders that he had been informed by visitors to Germany "that the synagogues were crowded and apparently there is nothing very wrong in the situation [of Germany's Jews] at present."
Rafael Wolff, director of the Wyman Institute, said totalitarian regimes have a record of using international events to whitewhash human rights abuses.
"Sadly, even presidents get taken in by propaganda," he said. "One hopes President Bush won't similarly fall for efforts by the Chinese government to soft-pedal their abuses today."
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Friday, May 9, 2008
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
[+/-] : Take Action: No Olympic Torch in Tibet!
Tell Coke: No Torch in Tibet!
Coca-Cola, one of the most powerful corporations in the world, is an official sponsor of China's torch relay. Please join Tibetans and supporters worldwide in calling on Coke's executives to use their influence to pressure the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to withdraw Tibet from the torch relay route. Click here to take action now (link is: www.studentsforafreetibet.org/coke)
Also, please keep the pressure on the IOC Executive Members, click here to contact them now. (http://actionnetwork.org/campaign/ioc_executive)
Spread the word by sharing the video above and Click here to learn more....
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Coca-Cola, one of the most powerful corporations in the world, is an official sponsor of China's torch relay. Please join Tibetans and supporters worldwide in calling on Coke's executives to use their influence to pressure the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to withdraw Tibet from the torch relay route. Click here to take action now (link is: www.studentsforafreetibet.org/coke)
Also, please keep the pressure on the IOC Executive Members, click here to contact them now. (http://actionnetwork.org/campaign/ioc_executive)
Spread the word by sharing the video above and Click here to learn more....
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Monday, May 5, 2008
Friday, May 2, 2008
[+/-] : After Troubled Tour, Torch Arrives in China
Kin Cheung/Associated PressPolice officers prevented Leung Kwok-hung, a lawmaker and pro-democracy activist, from moving closer to the Olympic flame welcoming ceremony in Hong Kong on Wednesday.
After Troubled Tour, Torch Arrives in China
By GRAHAM BOWLEY and KEITH BRADSHER, The New York Times
The Olympic torch returned to China on Wednesday in preparation for its first relay on Chinese soil after a troubled worldwide tour.
There were no reports of protests, but several advocates critical of China had already been deported. The torch’s relay through Hong Kong will take place on Friday.
The torch’s arrival in Hong Kong has been depicted as part of a broader struggle over Hong Kong’s evolving role as an autonomous territory of China. The torch, traveling from Vietnam, landed at Hong Kong International Airport, where it was greeted by a marching band and flag-waving children dressed in red and white tracksuits, The Associated Press reported.
The torch was then taken to a welcoming ceremony at a cultural center.
On Saturday, the Hong Kong government denied entry to three Danish human rights advocates who had hoped to protest at the torch relay, detaining them for six hours and then putting them against their will on a flight to London. A Tibetan monk was stopped on arrival at the airport over the weekend and forced to fly elsewhere, according to the local news media.
On Tuesday, three pro-Tibet advocates were deported after they arrived at the airport in Hong Kong, The A.P. said.
In a statement on Wednesday, Amnesty International urged the Hong Kong authorities to allow protesters “to engage in peaceful demonstrations before, during and after the Olympic torch relay.”
Despite the deportations, local critics of China’s human rights record are still planning to demonstrate, and more rights advocates from overseas are expected to try to enter the territory of Hong Kong to hold their own protests, notably the actress Mia Farrow, who is now one of the most prominent critics of China’s role in the Darfur region of Sudan.
About 3,000 police officers planned to guard the torch during its relay on Friday, The A.P. reported.
The Hong Kong police authorities have been making extensive preparations to try to separate critics and supporters of China on Friday. “It has been, and continues to be, the Hong Kong Police Force’s policy to endeavor to facilitate, as far as possible, all peaceful public order activities,” the police said in an e-mail response to questions.
The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, which commemorates the Tiananmen Square killings in 1989 and seeks human rights improvements in Hong Kong, held a small demonstration on Monday to protest the government’s decision to block the entry of the Danish advocates.
“It really hurts the image of Hong Kong as an international city when we start restricting freedom of access,” said Lee Cheuk-yan, a union leader, Hong Kong legislator and vice chairman of the alliance.
Any protests that take place Friday could be an early glimpse of demonstrations to come during the Olympics in August. The International Olympic Committee moved all six Olympic equestrian events from Beijing to Hong Kong after Beijing failed to convince international veterinary groups that horses brought into mainland China could be kept free of equine diseases.
Groups critical of China are considering whether to hold protests at Olympic events here or in Beijing. Hong Kong has a tradition of tolerating peaceful protest, but Beijing will host more Olympic events, so protests there may receive greater attention.
Reached by telephone on Sunday night at her Connecticut home, Ms. Farrow said she had not been aware that rights advocates were being stopped at the airport. She still planned to fly to Hong Kong this week.
“I don’t think we have a choice; we have to go,” said Ms. Farrow, chairwoman of the advisory board of Dream for Darfur, a group that criticizes China for its diplomatic, military and commercial ties to Sudan.
The Hong Kong immigration authorities have a policy of not commenting on individual cases. But officials have said in recent weeks that any government has the right to refuse entry to those who may be disruptive, and they have denied suggestions that the city is taking orders from Beijing.
Before Britain returned Hong Kong to Chinese rule in 1997, the Chinese government promised to let Hong Kong run its own domestic affairs, including immigration policies, with considerable autonomy until 2047.
Chinese citizens and people of Chinese descent have shown up in large numbers at torch relay events from San Francisco to Sydney and have sometimes scuffled with critics of China’s policies in Tibet. Three Japanese citizens received blows when they tried to unfurl a pro-Tibet banner at the torch relay in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, but suffered no lasting injuries, according to the Japanese Embassy there. Pro-China demonstrators also threw rocks, water bottles, and plastic and metal pipes at critics of China during the torch relay on Sunday in Seoul, South Korea.
Official Chinese news media have exhorted citizens in recent days to “defend the torch” in each city on the relay route. “We are worried that we may be confronted by these nationalists,” said Mr. Lee, of the Hong Kong Alliance.
Jill Savitt, the executive director of Dream for Darfur, who plans to arrive here with Ms. Farrow on Thursday, said that it was in the interest of Beijing officials to encourage Hong Kong to allow advocates to enter. “They have just called more attention to their repressive policies than letting them in would have done,” she said.
Dream for Darfur had been planning to hold protests in Beijing, but is concerned now about the increasingly tough Chinese position toward protesters, and is considering whether to shift demonstrations to the Hong Kong events instead, Ms. Savitt said.
The Chinese government has said repeatedly that it is seeking peace in Darfur, and its top envoy for the region has made a series of trips in an effort to win an agreement among the various warring factions. But groups like Dream for Darfur hold Beijing responsible for providing military, diplomatic and commercial assistance to the government of Sudan, which the activists accuse of allowing and even encouraging widespread murders and other human rights abuses in Darfur.
Graham Bowley reported from New York, and Keith Bradsher from Hong Kong.
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Thursday, May 1, 2008
[+/-] : United States Should Boycott Olympics: Send Message to China and World
United States Should Boycott Olympics: Send Message to China and World
According the American Heritage dictionary, fascism is a system of government marked by 1) centralization of authority under a dictator, 2) stringent socioeconomic controls, 3) suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and 4) a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism. The Chinese autocratic regime gleefully fulfills this definition. China’s forced occupation of Tibet has led to the deaths of an estimated 1.2 million Tibetans. Additionally China’s direct support of the Sudan genocide blatantly continues. Within China's borders, compulsory family “planning” and forced abortions are universal. China has hundreds of forced-labor prisons, which hold political and religious dissidents. There are firsthand reports of physical and psychological torture, confessions forced by torture, live organ harvesting, and other inconceivable atrocities within these prisons.
America should send a message to China: we do not support you; we will not attend the Olympics....
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According the American Heritage dictionary, fascism is a system of government marked by 1) centralization of authority under a dictator, 2) stringent socioeconomic controls, 3) suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and 4) a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism. The Chinese autocratic regime gleefully fulfills this definition. China’s forced occupation of Tibet has led to the deaths of an estimated 1.2 million Tibetans. Additionally China’s direct support of the Sudan genocide blatantly continues. Within China's borders, compulsory family “planning” and forced abortions are universal. China has hundreds of forced-labor prisons, which hold political and religious dissidents. There are firsthand reports of physical and psychological torture, confessions forced by torture, live organ harvesting, and other inconceivable atrocities within these prisons.
America should send a message to China: we do not support you; we will not attend the Olympics....
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Tuesday, April 29, 2008
[+/-] : Torch Nears, Posing Test of Autonomy in Hong Kong
Torch Nears, Posing Test of Autonomy in Hong Kong
By KEITH BRADSHER , The New York Times
HONG KONG — The Olympic torch relay coming here on Friday, the first on Chinese soil, is turning into a broader struggle over Hong Kong’s evolving role as an autonomous territory of China.
On Saturday, the Hong Kong government denied entry to three Danish human rights advocates who had hoped to protest at the torch relay, detaining them for six hours and then putting them against their will on a flight to London. A Tibetan monk was stopped on arrival at the airport over the weekend and forced to fly elsewhere, according to the local news media.
But local critics of China’s human rights record are still planning to demonstrate, and more rights advocates from overseas are expected to try to enter the territory of Hong Kong to hold their own protests, notably the actress Mia Farrow, who is now one of the most prominent critics of China’s role in the Darfur region of Sudan.
The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, which commemorates the Tiananmen Square killings in 1989 and seeks human rights improvements in Hong Kong, held a small demonstration on Monday to protest the government’s decision to block the entry of the Danish advocates.
“It really hurts the image of Hong Kong as an international city when we start restricting freedom of access,” said Lee Cheuk-yan, a union leader, Hong Kong legislator and vice chairman of the alliance.
Any protests that take place Friday could be an early glimpse of demonstrations to come during the Olympics in August. The International Olympic Committee moved all six Olympic equestrian events from Beijing to Hong Kong after Beijing failed to convince international veterinary groups that horses brought into mainland China could be kept free of equine diseases.
Groups critical of China are considering whether to hold protests at Olympic events here or in Beijing. Hong Kong has a tradition of tolerating peaceful protest, but Beijing will host more Olympic events, so protests there may receive greater attention.
Reached by telephone on Sunday night at her Connecticut home, Ms. Farrow said she had not been aware that rights advocates were being stopped at the airport. She still planned to fly to Hong Kong later in the week.
“I don’t think we have a choice; we have to go,” said Ms. Farrow, chairwoman of the advisory board of Dream for Darfur, a group that criticizes China for its diplomatic, military and commercial ties to Sudan.
The Hong Kong immigration authorities have a policy of not commenting on individual cases. But officials have said in recent weeks that any government has the right to refuse entry to those who may be disruptive, and they have denied suggestions that the city is taking orders from Beijing.
Before Britain returned Hong Kong to Chinese rule in 1997, the Chinese government promised to let Hong Kong run its own domestic affairs, including immigration policies, with considerable autonomy until 2047.
Chinese citizens and people of Chinese descent have shown up in large numbers at torch relay events from San Francisco to Sydney and have sometimes scuffled with critics of China’s policies in Tibet. Three Japanese citizens received blows when they tried to unfurl a pro-Tibet banner at the torch relay in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, but suffered no lasting injuries, according to the Japanese Embassy there. Pro-China demonstrators also threw rocks, water bottles, and plastic and metal pipes at critics of China during the torch relay on Sunday in Seoul, South Korea.
Official Chinese news media have exhorted citizens in recent days to “defend the torch” in each city on the relay route. “We are worried that we may be confronted by these nationalists,” said Mr. Lee, of the Hong Kong Alliance.
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By KEITH BRADSHER , The New York Times
HONG KONG — The Olympic torch relay coming here on Friday, the first on Chinese soil, is turning into a broader struggle over Hong Kong’s evolving role as an autonomous territory of China.
On Saturday, the Hong Kong government denied entry to three Danish human rights advocates who had hoped to protest at the torch relay, detaining them for six hours and then putting them against their will on a flight to London. A Tibetan monk was stopped on arrival at the airport over the weekend and forced to fly elsewhere, according to the local news media.
But local critics of China’s human rights record are still planning to demonstrate, and more rights advocates from overseas are expected to try to enter the territory of Hong Kong to hold their own protests, notably the actress Mia Farrow, who is now one of the most prominent critics of China’s role in the Darfur region of Sudan.
The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, which commemorates the Tiananmen Square killings in 1989 and seeks human rights improvements in Hong Kong, held a small demonstration on Monday to protest the government’s decision to block the entry of the Danish advocates.
“It really hurts the image of Hong Kong as an international city when we start restricting freedom of access,” said Lee Cheuk-yan, a union leader, Hong Kong legislator and vice chairman of the alliance.
Any protests that take place Friday could be an early glimpse of demonstrations to come during the Olympics in August. The International Olympic Committee moved all six Olympic equestrian events from Beijing to Hong Kong after Beijing failed to convince international veterinary groups that horses brought into mainland China could be kept free of equine diseases.
Groups critical of China are considering whether to hold protests at Olympic events here or in Beijing. Hong Kong has a tradition of tolerating peaceful protest, but Beijing will host more Olympic events, so protests there may receive greater attention.
Reached by telephone on Sunday night at her Connecticut home, Ms. Farrow said she had not been aware that rights advocates were being stopped at the airport. She still planned to fly to Hong Kong later in the week.
“I don’t think we have a choice; we have to go,” said Ms. Farrow, chairwoman of the advisory board of Dream for Darfur, a group that criticizes China for its diplomatic, military and commercial ties to Sudan.
The Hong Kong immigration authorities have a policy of not commenting on individual cases. But officials have said in recent weeks that any government has the right to refuse entry to those who may be disruptive, and they have denied suggestions that the city is taking orders from Beijing.
Before Britain returned Hong Kong to Chinese rule in 1997, the Chinese government promised to let Hong Kong run its own domestic affairs, including immigration policies, with considerable autonomy until 2047.
Chinese citizens and people of Chinese descent have shown up in large numbers at torch relay events from San Francisco to Sydney and have sometimes scuffled with critics of China’s policies in Tibet. Three Japanese citizens received blows when they tried to unfurl a pro-Tibet banner at the torch relay in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, but suffered no lasting injuries, according to the Japanese Embassy there. Pro-China demonstrators also threw rocks, water bottles, and plastic and metal pipes at critics of China during the torch relay on Sunday in Seoul, South Korea.
Official Chinese news media have exhorted citizens in recent days to “defend the torch” in each city on the relay route. “We are worried that we may be confronted by these nationalists,” said Mr. Lee, of the Hong Kong Alliance.
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Monday, April 28, 2008
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Friday, April 25, 2008
[+/-] : Coca-Cola Faces Critics of Its Olympics Support
Bradley C. Bower/Associated Press
Pro-Tibet demonstrators picketed and chanted outside Coca-Cola’s annual meeting in Wilmington, Del., on Wednesday.
Coca-Cola Faces Critics of Its Olympics Support
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD , The New York Times
April 17, 2008
It is getting tougher to be a global brand these days. Just ask Coke.
As one of the most prominent sponsors of the Olympics, Coca-Cola found itself on the hot seat on Wednesday at its annual shareholder meeting in Wilmington, Del. Outside, protesters chanted and waved picket signs. Inside, they engaged the chief executive, E. Neville Isdell, in a rare public dialogue about China’s human rights record in Tibet.
“Will you tell the I.O.C. to stop taking the Olympic torch relay into Tibet, because Tibet belongs to Tibetans?” asked one protester in the audience, Lobsang Choefel, who described himself as a native Tibetan. He was referring to the International Olympic Committee.
Mr. Isdell — who had just described first-quarter results that rose on the strength of international sales in countries like China — stood firm. The torch relay “has symbolized openness, it has symbolized hopes,” he said. “I don’t believe that stopping the torch run is in any way over the long term going to be the right thing to do.”
The moment seemed to encapsulate the quandary the Olympics sponsors face as protests unfurl across various continents. In India, home to more than 100,000 Tibetans in exile and their religious leader, the Dalai Lama, even the official corporate sponsors avoided buying television and radio ads that were timed to the Olympic torch relay on Thursday, media executives there said.
And in China, a different sort of backlash has been taking shape — against the companies from countries that seem to be putting pressure on China. French companies like Carrefour are a particular target because of the mayhem during the Paris leg of the torch relay and because the French president has said he may skip the opening ceremony in Beijing over China’s human rights record.
“I think boycotting Carrefour is a peaceful and polite way to express our anger, our Chinese feelings got deeply hurt by France,” said Li Meng, a 25-year-old mechanic who is selling T-shirts in support of the boycott movement in the city of Yantai, in eastern China. “France humiliated China during the torch relay and keeps making trouble for the Olympics.”
American brands like McDonald’s and KFC have also been named as targets of a boycott because some American politicians seem to be supporting the Dalai Lama, whom Beijing blames for instigating violence in Tibet to disrupt plans for the Olympics.
No one knows whether there is widespread support for the boycotts, but the opposition comes at a time when many of the world’s biggest brands — including Coke — are expanding aggressively in China and planning huge sales and marketing campaigns to coincide with the Olympics.
Coca-Cola’s most recent quarterly results suggest the extent of its reliance on the Chinese market. During the first quarter, Coke’s unit case volume sales in China were up 20 percent in the quarter, one of the highest figures from any country. Over all, the company’s net income rose 19 percent in the quarter, to $1.5 billion, from $1.26 billion a year ago.
Bill Pecoriello, research analyst at Morgan Stanley, estimates that 5 to 6 percent of Coke’s total revenue comes from China (Coca-Cola does not break out the figure).
The importance of China for Coke should increase, Mr. Pecoriello said. He estimated that Coke sold 1.2 billion cases in China in 2007 and forecast that it would sell 1.5 billion cases there in 2008. That compares with larger but slower-growing sales in the United States: 5.4 billion cases in 2007 and 5.45 billion cases in 2008, Mr. Pecoriello said.
Neither Coca-Cola nor any of the other Olympic sponsors has flinched in its public support for the games, but the groups that are protesting China’s policies in Tibet and Darfur are vowing to step up their pressure. This could lead to showdowns, or even to a possible whipsaw for the companies if Chinese youths start protesting en masse in the other direction.
“We’re not asking Coke to solve Tibet’s problems,” Lhadon Tethong, the director of an organizing group called Students for a Free Tibet, told Mr. Isdell at the shareholder meeting on Wednesday. “We’re not asking you to do anything else but tell the I.O.C. this is not the time for the torch to go to Tibet.”
Ms. Tethong added, “You have influence, and you know you have influence. Please don’t hide behind a spin.”
Mr. Isdell — who will be succeeded by the company’s president and chief operating officer, Muhtar Kent, by the time the Olympics start in August — responded politely and at some length. “I want to thank you for your clarification and also for your declared integrity,” he said, adding that, technically, the route of the torch was not governed by the I.O.C., but by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games. On a philosophical note, Mr. Isdell added, “We still believe that the torch is a light of hope, and we trust that’s what it will be as it goes every single place in the world.”
In the future, Mr. Isdell suggested, the company does still want to buy the world a Coke. “We are already a sponsor of the Olympic games — wherever they may go — through 2020, and I trust that will continue through 2028,” he said.
Last week, several other sponsors, including Visa International, McDonald’s, Johnson & Johnson, Anheuser-Busch, Bank of America, Home Depot, United Parcel Service and AT&T reaffirmed their support of the Olympics and said that their marketing plans had not changed because of the protests.
“As critical as Tibet is, I think sponsors are looking at the situation saying, ‘We’ve still got days to go,’ ” said Damien Ryan, director of Ryan Financial Communications, a Hong Kong media relations firm that has sponsors as clients. “Things can change quite quickly, and from their point of view, they realize that Beijing has got a long memory.”
David Barboza contributed reporting from Shanghai and Heather Timmons from New Delhi.
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[+/-] : Bracing for Games, China Sets Rules That Complicate Life for Foreigners
Christie Johnston , The New York Times
Outside a visa application office in Hong Kong. China has imposed new restrictions on visas that concern many foreigners.
Bracing for Games, China Sets Rules That Complicate Life for Foreigners
By ANDREW JACOBS for The New York Times
April 24, 2008
BEIJING — In little more than 100 days, China will open its arms to a deluge of foreigners, many of whom will be pleasantly surprised to find a dizzying array of designer boutiques and painfully hip martini bars that divert expatriates and middle-class Chinese in this once dowdy capital.
But even as Beijing is promising to welcome 1.5 million visitors to the Olympic Games, public security officials are tightening controls over daily life and introducing visa restrictions that are causing anxiety among the 250,000 foreigners who have settled here in recent years.
The visa rules, which were introduced last week with little explanation, restrict many visitors to 30-day stays, replacing flexible, multiple-entry visas that had allowed people to remain for up to a year. The new rules make it harder for foreigners to live and work in Beijing without applying for residency permits, which can be difficult to obtain. The restrictions are also complicating the lives of businesspeople in Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore used to crossing the border with ease.
“I can’t begin to explain how serious this is going to be,” said Richard Vuylsteke, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong. “A barrier like this is going to have a real ripple effect on business.”
The government wants to present a blemish-free image of Beijing for the Olympics. Police officers have cleared away street beggars and closed down shops selling pirated DVDs, while also forcing some migrant workers to go back to the countryside.
Over the last month the police have raided bars and clubs suspected of harboring drug dealers. An operation two weeks ago that netted a group of French teenagers has provoked charges of heavy-handed police tactics.
Other restrictions can seem random, like a decision on Wednesday that forced the cancellation of a popular music festival a week before its start. Organizers of the eight-year-old event, the Midi Festival, said officials had told them they were concerned about security. More than 80 bands, many of them from abroad, were scheduled to perform.
But most of the fear and consternation has been prompted by the new visa rules, which have thousands of foreign residents scrambling for black market documents — or contemplating leaving. Residents who in the past could apply locally to extend yearlong tourist or business visas have been instructed to return home and apply for the short-term visas at the Chinese Embassy in their home countries.
Some, like Desmond McGarry, a jazz musician who has lived here since 2002, said they would probably leave. For Mr. McGarry, returning to Canada would mean abandoning his apartment and a network of friends. “It’s been very comfortable until now, even if we existed in a gray zone,” he said. “Maybe I’ll leave and try to come back in the fall when things calm down.”
The new visa rules come at a time of heightened tensions in Beijing and other cities, where public anger has been directed at Western governments and overseas news organizations seen as sympathetic to Tibetan independence. Over the last week, that discontent has fueled demonstrations at the French Embassy in Beijing and at outlets of Carrefour, a French supermarket chain whose executives have been accused of aligning themselves with the Dalai Lama. Some foreign residents are nervously awaiting next Thursday, the first day of a planned Carrefour boycott.
Although the majority of foreigners say they have seen no change in the behavior of their Chinese neighbors and co-workers, some French residents complain that nationalist ire is seeping into their daily lives. One businessman who plays tennis at a Chinese sports club said acquaintances refused to join him on the court last weekend.
More ominously, the owner of a popular French restaurant here said he was denied a visa extension on Wednesday by an official who simply told him, “It’s because you’re French.” The man, who asked that his name and business not be printed for fear of antagonizing the authorities, said he was in a panic. “My whole life is here,” he said.
Most Westerners readily acknowledge that they enjoy privileged lives, including unspoken immunity from the tangle of rules that can complicate the lives of average Chinese.
That may be about to change. Last week English-language signs began appearing on Beijing streets and in high-end apartment buildings directing foreigners not staying in hotels to register with the police. The regulations, which are not new but are rarely enforced, promise steep fines for those who do not comply.
Because the government has not issued formal guidelines about the new visa rules, rumors and uncertainty have been rife, and travel agents say that a handful of tourists have been denied visas without evident rationale.
Cloris Yip, the manager of Smiley Travel in Hong Kong, cited the example of two tourists, a Swiss and a German; the Swiss citizen received a 30-day visa while his German companion was given one for five days. The men, she said, canceled their trip.
“Maybe the Chinese government is not so happy with the Germans right now,” Ms. Yip said. “Maybe they think some foreigners want to protest Tibet during the Games. Either way, you cannot argue or negotiate.”
Businessmen are also feeling powerless. Hong Kong executives accustomed to visiting mainland factories or construction projects every few days are now spending one day each week waiting for new single- or double-entry visas.
“Everyone is affected by it, and they are very unhappy,” said Seth Peterson, a vice president of Techtronic Industries Company, which manufactures vacuum cleaners and power tools in southern China.
Asked about the restrictions, Jiang Yu, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, insisted that there had been no change in visa rules. “The Chinese people will welcome foreign friends in a warm, enthusiastic and open-minded way,” she said during a news conference on Tuesday.
Whether or not these are just temporary measures, those who depend on foreign expertise for their businesses say the impact has been real. Collin Crowell, the managing editor of City Weekend, an English-language entertainment guide in Beijing, said the new requirements were causing consternation among the magazine’s freelance writers.
And Raluca Riquet, an event planner who is organizing art shows for the summer, said she was struggling to find curators with valid visas.
“We’ll find a solution, but it’s not so easy,” said Ms. Riquet, who holds dual French and Romanian citizenship. “The government really wants to control everything and everybody before the Olympics. For us foreigners, it’s a really big change.”
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[+/-] : Foreign Press Set for Curtailed Everest Torch Trip
Foreign Press Set for Curtailed Everest Torch Trip
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
April 25, 2008
BEIJING (Agence France-Presse) — A group of foreign reporters prepared on Thursday to go to Tibet to cover the ascent of the Olympic torch to Mount Everest. They were the first overseas journalists allowed into the riot-scarred region in a month.
China plans to take a special high-altitude Olympic torch to the summit of Everest, the world’s tallest peak, in May, and had invited reporters from around the world to cover the event as a triumphal symbol of Beijing’s role as host of the Olympics in August.
The media delegation was to leave Beijing on Friday for the tightly managed trip. China made late changes this week to curtail reporting, in the wake of unrest in Tibet.
Olympic officials said no coverage would be allowed of a mountaineering team’s departure from base camp with the torch, tentatively set for Saturday, nor of anything unrelated to the torch.
Reporters have raised concerns about their health because a new schedule calls for a trip of about three days through Tibet to the Mount Everest base camp. The journalists said that ascending too quickly to the camp’s elevation of 16,900 feet could cause severe health problems.
Experts say the trip from Beijing, which is near sea level, to such a high altitude should not be made in less than a week.
Officials denied that the plans had been changed in response to the unrest in Tibet. The Olympic torch has become a magnet for protests against China’s crackdown on Tibetan unrest and China’s human rights record.
The trip appeared thrown into further chaos early Thursday when the organizers of the Olympics suddenly set a Thursday morning payment deadline for air tickets to Lhasa, the Tibetan capital. An Olympic official charged with collecting payments then inexplicably refused to accept fees from some news organizations. Later, several were invited to go ahead with the trip. The New York Times was not invited to participate.
Some news organizations decided not to participate. Agence France-Presse decided not to send a reporter, mainly because of health concerns.
China tightened control on Tibet after anti-Chinese rioting broke out in Lhasa on March 14, spreading across the Tibetan plateau, and expelled foreign reporters and tourists from the Himalayan region.
Reporters Without Borders, which advocates press freedom, has echoed widespread calls for unfettered news media access to Tibet. Human rights groups continue to report disturbances and arrests in the region.
”Things are clearly far from being back to normal as the authorities claim,” Reporters Without Borders said. “The few reports emerging suggest a very different situation, one of arrests and a climate of fear in the cities and around the monasteries.
Foreign journalists last were allowed to enter Tibet for a government-led news media trip to Lhasa in late March.
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By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
April 25, 2008
BEIJING (Agence France-Presse) — A group of foreign reporters prepared on Thursday to go to Tibet to cover the ascent of the Olympic torch to Mount Everest. They were the first overseas journalists allowed into the riot-scarred region in a month.
China plans to take a special high-altitude Olympic torch to the summit of Everest, the world’s tallest peak, in May, and had invited reporters from around the world to cover the event as a triumphal symbol of Beijing’s role as host of the Olympics in August.
The media delegation was to leave Beijing on Friday for the tightly managed trip. China made late changes this week to curtail reporting, in the wake of unrest in Tibet.
Olympic officials said no coverage would be allowed of a mountaineering team’s departure from base camp with the torch, tentatively set for Saturday, nor of anything unrelated to the torch.
Reporters have raised concerns about their health because a new schedule calls for a trip of about three days through Tibet to the Mount Everest base camp. The journalists said that ascending too quickly to the camp’s elevation of 16,900 feet could cause severe health problems.
Experts say the trip from Beijing, which is near sea level, to such a high altitude should not be made in less than a week.
Officials denied that the plans had been changed in response to the unrest in Tibet. The Olympic torch has become a magnet for protests against China’s crackdown on Tibetan unrest and China’s human rights record.
The trip appeared thrown into further chaos early Thursday when the organizers of the Olympics suddenly set a Thursday morning payment deadline for air tickets to Lhasa, the Tibetan capital. An Olympic official charged with collecting payments then inexplicably refused to accept fees from some news organizations. Later, several were invited to go ahead with the trip. The New York Times was not invited to participate.
Some news organizations decided not to participate. Agence France-Presse decided not to send a reporter, mainly because of health concerns.
China tightened control on Tibet after anti-Chinese rioting broke out in Lhasa on March 14, spreading across the Tibetan plateau, and expelled foreign reporters and tourists from the Himalayan region.
Reporters Without Borders, which advocates press freedom, has echoed widespread calls for unfettered news media access to Tibet. Human rights groups continue to report disturbances and arrests in the region.
”Things are clearly far from being back to normal as the authorities claim,” Reporters Without Borders said. “The few reports emerging suggest a very different situation, one of arrests and a climate of fear in the cities and around the monasteries.
Foreign journalists last were allowed to enter Tibet for a government-led news media trip to Lhasa in late March.
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