Days before, the torch-lighting ceremony of Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in Athens, was disturbed several protests. The protesters politically opposed the Chinese government, and moved further to boycott the games and appealed to the athlete’s refusal to participate the games. These protesters mainly came from a Tibetan organization called “Students for a Free Tibet”，of which the members actively criticize the PRC government for long time.
It is not the first Olympic Games been boycotted. The 1976, 1980, and 1984 Summer Olympics all experienced multi-national boycotts and refusal. The International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach, who won a team gold medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics, recalled that he saw some athletes have to quit the games and leave the Athletes Village with desolation because their own government’s boycott. “Many of them cried, some bowed their head desperately. After years of effort and anticipation, their Olympic dreams vanished at the last minute.” Before Thomas Bach, former president of the International Olympic Committee Jacques Rogge also hold a persistent stance in opposing the politicization of sports as well as using the Olympic Games to express political demands. As Belgium’s team leader for the 1980 Moscow Olympics, Jacques Rogge resisted pressure to adhere to the U.S.-led boycott following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Belgian team went to Moscow and competed under the Olympic flag.
For every Olympic Games, athletes from various countries and regions who have prepared for at least four years. Sports events should stay away from politics and protect the honor and dreams of athletes. As Thomas Bach said, “the Olympic Games is irrelevant to politics. As a non-governmental organization, the International Olympic Committee must strictly maintain political neutrality at any times”. Or as Jacques Rogge goes, “Politics should not interfere sports and loot athletes’ effort of a four-year-training”. Former IOC president Avery Brundage said that the Olympics games belongs to the athletes, not to the politicians.
