Olympic flame arrives in Beijing amid boycott calls

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Volunteers clasp the Olympic torch and the framework connected signifier during a invited ceremonial for the Frame of Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, held astatine the Olympic Tower successful Beijing, Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021. A invited ceremonial for the Olympic occurrence was held successful Beijing connected Wednesday greeting aft it arrived astatine the Chinese superior from Greece. While the occurrence volition beryllium enactment connected show implicit the adjacent fewer months, organizers said a three-day torch relay is scheduled starting February 2nd with astir 1200 torchbearers successful Beijing, Yanqing and Zhangjiakou. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

BEIJING – The Olympic occurrence arrived successful Beijing connected Wednesday amid calls from overseas critics for a boycott of the Feb. 4-20 Winter Games.

Beijing’s Communist Party Secretary Cai Qi, the apical authoritative successful the Chinese capital, received the occurrence astatine a closely-guarded airdrome ceremony.

Beijing successfully hosted the Summer Olympics successful 2008, though the lawsuit failed to nutrient the much unfastened governmental and societal situation successful China that galore had hoped for.

Activist groups disrupted the occurrence lighting ceremonial successful confederate Greece connected Monday, accusing the International Olympic Committee of granting legitimacy to rights abuses successful China. IOC officials person said they are committed to seeing the contention spell up and that rights issues are not portion of their remit.

Speaking successful the past stadium of Olympia, IOC President Thomas Bach said the Games indispensable beryllium “respected arsenic politically neutral ground.”

Activists connected Tuesday said quality rights successful China person deteriorated since 2008, claiming that the Summer Games “emboldened” China. Over those years, Communist Party person Xi Jinping has consolidated powerfulness implicit virtually each aspects of Chinese society.

Beijing is the archetypal metropolis to beryllium awarded hosting rights to some the Summer and Winter Games, mostly arsenic a effect of the reluctance of European and North American cities to bid for the 2022 edition.

Human rights activists, meanwhile, accidental China’s oppression of governmental critics, on with number groups including Tibetan Buddhists and Muslim Uyghurs and a crackdown successful Hong Kong should punctual athletes and politicians to shun the games.

China says spectators from extracurricular China won’t beryllium allowed to be the Winter Games due to the fact that of the COVID-19 pandemic, and athletes indispensable stay successful a bubble to defender against the dispersed of coronavirus. China has mostly stamped-out home transmission of the disease, the archetypal cases of which were detected successful the cardinal Chinese metropolis of Wuhan successful precocious 2019.

At Wednesday's occurrence handover ceremony, Deputy Beijing Mayor Zhang Jiandong said the metropolis was committed to holding a “simple, harmless and fantabulous Games."

China and the IOC person collaborated to plan a truncated torch relay that reduces the fig of routes and unit involved, Zhang said.

“We importune connected prioritizing nationalist wellness and safety, and coordinate the torch relay with pandemic power and prevention requirements," Zhang said.

The occurrence volition beryllium placed connected show implicit the adjacent fewer months, with a three-day relay scheduled to commencement Feb. 2, involving astir 1,200 torchbearers successful Beijing, suburban Yanqing and Zhangjiakou successful neighboring Hebei state wherever skis jumping and different outdoor events volition beryllium held.

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