• Beijing 2022 Olympics. CNN: "US will announce diplomatic boycott"

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by Tiziana Di Giovannandrea

24 December 2021 The front against the Beijing Winter Olympics widens. Japan will not send

ministerial officials

, a government delegation to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics to be held in February, Kyodo news agency reports.



The diplomatic boycott has already been decided this month by other countries as well. 

The United States

,

 Canada

,

Australia

,

Great Britain

have announced the sabotage of the Beijing Games of 4-20 February 2022 to denounce the violations of human rights in China. Beijing has warned the four Western countries that they will pay "the price" for their decision.



The

athletes and the President of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Organizing Committee, Seiko Hashimoto, as well as the President of the Japanese Olympic Committee Yasuhiro Yamashita and Kazuyuki Mori, at the top of the Paralympic Committee, added the official government spokesman Hirokazu Matsuno. Hashimoto will go to Beijing "to express gratitude and respect to the athletes and other people who supported the Tokyo Games" held last summer, he added. In contrast, Japan "does not plan to send government officials" to the Winter Olympics in China, the spokesman said.



The

Japan

, host of the Tokyo 2020 Games postponed for a year due to Coronavirus - in fact the Summer Olympics were held in Tokyo from 23 July to 8 August 2021 -, is in a delicate diplomatic position between the United States and China, two important business partners. Tokyo does not speak explicitly of a diplomatic boycott but of "freedom and human rights". According to government sources cited by the Kyodo agency, the decision would be linked to "small improvements" with respect to the human rights situation in Xinjiang and Hong Kong. "We believe it is important that universal values ​​such as freedom, respect for fundamental human rights and the rule of law are guaranteed in China," said government spokesman Hirokazu Matsuno, without speaking of a diplomatic boycott.



There

South Korea

, another US ally, for its part announced earlier last week that it would not diplomatically boycott the Chinese Winter Olympics, justifying the decision by continuing to cooperate with China.



The

International Olympic Committee

(IOC) has meanwhile invoked its "neutrality" on the issue, refusing to comment on "purely political decisions" and above all hailing the absence of a sports boycott. According to human rights organizations, at least one million Uighurs and other Turkish-speaking minorities, mostly Muslims, are detained in Xinjiang camps. China is accused of forcibly sterilizing women and imposing forced labor.