Advocacy group urges Olympic Committee to do more for Darfur

July 18, 2007 (NEW YORK) — A global advocacy campaign using the 2008 Olympics to highlight China’s role in the Darfur genocide said the International Olympic Committee’s distribution of sportswear at a refugee camp on July 18 is a welcome gesture, but called on the IOC to use its influence with the Olympic host nation to urge China to do more to end the violence in Darfur.

“We welcome the fact that the IOC recognizes the Darfur tragedy,” said Jill Savitt, Director of Olympic Dream for Darfur. “But in addition to handing out sportswear, the IOC should help ensure security for Darfurians, by using its position of influence to persuade China to take a leadership role on Darfur. If the IOC and China do not act, the Games will be marred by an ongoing genocide – a genocide in which the Chinese government is complicit.”

There is broad consensus within the Darfur advocacy community that China is a – if not the – key to providing security in Darfur. In its role as Olympic host and close partner of Sudan, China could use its influence to press Khartoum to allow a civilian protection operation in to Darfur, Savitt said. The IOC, as custodian of the Olympics, is in a position to influence Beijing.

In the past month, the Olympic Dream for Darfur campaign has written to the IOC, the US Olympic Committee, and Olympic corporate sponsors, urging them to impress upon the Chinese government the urgency of a response to deteriorating security on the ground in Darfur. Beijing must exert its influence well before the Olympics – or risk facing mounting public pressure over the role of the Olympic host.

In August, Olympic Dream for Darfur will launch a symbolic torch relay, starting on the Chad/Darfur border, which will stop in six countries historically associated with genocide. There will also be a simultaneous US torch relay, from September to December, through more than 20 states, and symbolic torch relays in Canada and Australia as well.

“The theme of the Beijing Games, ‘One World/One Dream,’ will seem perversely ironic – even hypocritical — if images of the dead and the dying in Darfur are juxtaposed with images from the Games, hosted by a country facilitating the suffering and destruction,” Savitt said. “Such a juxtaposition can only serve to tarnish the Olympics, and all it represents. The IOC is in a position to make sure this doesn’t happen.”

In announcing the ”Giving is Winning” launch, IOC President Dr. Jacques Rogge said the project, a joint effort with the UN and the US Olympic Committee “will bring hope and joy to thousands of refugees.”

Dream for Darfur, which runs the Olympic Dream for Darfur campaign, said it does not advocate a boycott of the 2008 Games.

“Our goal is to highlight the fact that China is hosting the Olympics – while it is also a close partner of the genocidal regime in Sudan – and by thus drawing attention to the plight of Darfurians, elicit a change in China’s policy toward Sudan. ”

(ST)