China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi said in the English-language China Daily that a resolution introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives urging the IOC not to select Beijing as host of the 2008 Games, unless human rights conditions improve, is a “blatant contradiction” of the Olympic spirit.
He said “discrimination against a country or person on religious, political or gender grounds is incompatible with that spirit”.
Meanwhile, according to the government’s Xinhua News Agency, Chinese President Jiang Zemin pledged that the national government and China’s citizenry stand behind the city’s bid for 2008.
And in a letter to IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch, Jiang wrote “my colleagues and I fully support Beijing’s Olympic bid. If the 2008 Olympic Games can be held in Beijing, a fast-developing city with a long-standing civilzation, it will be of great significance to the Olympic Movement, to China and the world at large”.
