The Olympics and Human Rights

 

                                                         Uyghur Concentration Camp 

Are you looking to forward to watching the Summer Olympics in Japan this summer? It's rather hard to believe that this massive athletic event will actually take place, given the ongoing reality of the COVID-19, but hope springs eternal. I certainly feel for the athletes who are living with uncertainty when it comes to their preparatory training and the brief window of elite performance. 

There is considerable discussion these days regarding the Olympic games only six months beyond Tokyo. The Winter Olympics are scheduled a year this month in China, and there is a call to boycott them because of China's miserable human rights record. The specific concern is the systematic persecution of the Uighur or Uyghur ethnic group which is a Muslim minority. An estimated million Uighurs have been incarcerated in camps where their religious practices are suppressed and indoctrination takes place. There are reports of forced labour, forced abortion, forced sterilization, forced birth control, rape and torture.A growing number of critics are describing this as genocide. 

Canada's ambassador to the United Nations, Bob Rae, has spoken against this mass incarceration, only to be blasted by the Chinese government. A couple of days ago Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole called for the relocation of the 2022 Winter Olympics because of the Chinese government's treatment of its Muslim minority population.He also cited the country's actions in Hong Kong and the ongoing detention of Canadian citizens Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor.

Of course there were protests against the Summer games being held in Beijing in 2008, and Olympic officials, then and now say that Olympic boycotts are not effective. Is it time to end the Olympics with their bloated cost, devastating social impact (think Brazil), and ignoring human rights transgressions? 

There is also the specific concern about religious freedom,  and as people of faith who enjoy that freedom we need to respond with prayer and encouragement to our government to be a voice for the voiceless.