In his concluding remarks on the 24th Olympic Winter Games, Thomas Bach invoked the spirit of peace.

"You are giving peace a chance," he called out to the athletes at the Beijing National Stadium.

"May world leaders be inspired by your example," said the President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

That sounded a little hollow given that Russian President Vladimir Putin, of all people, was the guest of honor at the opening ceremony two weeks ago.

Friederike Böge

Political correspondent for China, North Korea and Mongolia.

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As expected, Bach only had words of praise for the Chinese hosts.

The games were "truly extraordinary".

His predecessor Jacques Rogge had already ennobled the 2008 summer games in Beijing with the same words.

Avoiding political messages

Before Bach handed over the Olympic flag to the mayors of Milan and Cortina, where the next Winter Games are to take place in 2026, the Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou once again immersed the “Bird's Nest” in a sea of ​​light and colour.

Unlike at the opening ceremony, when the Uyghur skier Dilnegar Ilhamyan lit the Olympic flame, he refrained from highly political messages.

Instead, there was deliberately harmless symbolism.

Singing children's choirs, Schiller's Ode to Joy and references to Chinese traditions.

The Lantern Festival and the knot as a sign of togetherness.

At that point at the latest, it was clear that something was wrong with the algorithms in the Weibo network.

Apparently, the audience was so enthusiastic about the knot motif that more than 672 million internet users looked at posts with the hashtag.

China's new dream team, 18-year-old ski freestyler Eileen Gu and snowboarder Su Yiming, who was a year younger, created a good atmosphere when the athletes rolled in, jumping through the stadium together.

Both have known each other since they were children and both stand for a new, self-determined type of Chinese athlete in their own way.

For China, despite all the foreign criticism, the games were a success.

With nine gold medals, the country finished third in the medal table - a big jump from 16th place in PyeongChang four years ago.

The final two gold medals were fittingly awarded to Norway's Theresa Johaug and Russia's Alexander Bolschunov, both cross-country champions, during the closing ceremony.

The Norwegian anthem was sung for the sixteenth time - and Tchaikovsky for the sixth time, instead of the Russian anthem, which may not be played.

The moderators on Chinese state television did not respond.

The Chinese audience also got almost nothing from the doping scandal surrounding the Russian figure skater Kamila Valiewa.

It seemed more important to the Chinese media on Sunday that a million more copies of the Bing Dwen Dwen mascot had finally been delivered.

China has not disclosed the actual cost of the games until recently.

Several newspapers have looked at tenders and other documents and have come to very different conclusions.

The Financial Times estimates the cost to be at least $8.8 billion, the Wall Street Journal at $16 billion.

This includes, for example, five million dollars for weather research.

This investment seems to have paid off.

In any case, on Sunday the sky over Beijing was as clear as ever – and the air quality was identical to that in Frankfurt.