China Steps Up Its Argument Over Darfur

BEIJING, March 7 -- Liu Guijin, China's special envoy for Sudan, was
fielding yet another question Friday on Darfur and the Olympics.
Politics have no place in the Olympics, he told reporters, and it
violates the Olympic spirit to claim that China has a duty to do more
in the embattled western Sudanese region because Beijing is hosting
the 2008 Games.

But this time, Liu had a new argument in his briefcase: President Bush
agrees with China on this point. So does British Prime Minister Gordon
Brown, he said, not to mention French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Those world leaders have announced their willingness to attend a gala
opening ceremony Aug. 8, he noted. If people of that caliber think
Darfur is no reason to take the joy out of the Beijing Olympics, he
suggested, then the human rights activists and Darfur campaigners must
be out of line.

"More and more spokesmen and public figures have decided that
politicization of the Olympic Games is not compatible with the Olympic
spirit and that the Darfur question has no connection to the Olympic
Games," he said.

Liu's comments, at a Foreign Ministry briefing, marked the latest
salvo in a belated but increasingly active public diplomacy campaign
by the Chinese government. In news conferences, statements and widely
publicized actions, it has begun to duel openly with U.S. and European
activists who assert that hosting the Games bestows on China a
responsibility to improve its human rights record and work more
forcefully to end the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

"Their attitude will go nowhere," Liu said.