Dharamshala, 28th February: Free Tibet, a human rights organization, claims that the ultimate legacy of the Beijing 2022 Olympic Games will be the unification of campaigners. Free Tibet, in collaboration with Uyghur, Hong Kong, and Chinese activists, organized the No Beijing 2022 Olympics campaign, which they feel succeeded in overshadowing China’s grandstanding moment. They cite the diplomatic boycott of the Winter Games by ten countries: Australia, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Canada, Denmark, Estonia, India, Kosovo, Lithuania, and the United States.
In comparison to Pyeongchang 2018, the Opening Ceremony television figures in the United Kingdom fell by 50% and overall viewership fell by 42% after the #IWillNotWatch movement was launched. NBCUniversal, a US broadcaster, too had an all-time low in viewership. In a poll commissioned by Free Tibet before the Games, 58% of the UK population stated they would watch less coverage of Beijing 2022 than previous editions. Twenty percent stated that they would not watch the show at all.
Free Tibet is also proud of three of its activists, Jason Leith, Chemi Lhamo, and Fern MacDougal, who disrupted the annual lighting of the Olympic Torch in Olympia, Greece. For holding Tibet flags and a banner with the slogan “NO GENOCIDE GAMES,” the trio was arrested and imprisoned overnight. Greek officials postponed their hearing, which was scheduled for the day before the Opening Ceremony (February 3), because they did not want to humiliate China.
By altering and republishing an International Olympic Committee film intended to show sympathy with athletes, Free Tibet staged an online protest. The group claims that their version of the film, which was shared on Facebook and Instagram, was intended to “suppress” them.
They claimed that, in collaboration with other organizations, they had effectively shifted the focus of the Olympics to China’s “sports-washing” of human rights atrocities. The Olympic and Paralympic hosts have been accused of subjecting the Uyghur minority in Xinjiang to forced labor, mass monitoring, detention in internment camps, sterilizations, and genocide.