Olympic and Chinese officials gathered in Beijing Wednesday night to watch the countdown clock mark one year to go before the Beijing Olympic Games. The game will start at 8:08 on 08/08/08.
China is hoping to spotlight its return to prominence on the world stage by making the games the best ever. While work on the infrastructure and Olympic buildings is coming along, concerns linger over Beijing's pollution, traffic and food safety. Just this week, human right groups have staged protests to pressure China to improve civil liberties before the games.
The 2008 games will be the first Olympics to be held in the world's most populous nation. They are expected to draw the largest number of participants and spectators ever recorded.
International Olympics Committee President Jacques Rogge said Tuesday that Beijing's preparations for the games were impressive. He was even optimistic that there was still time to clean up the smog blanketing the capital.
"We should remember this is not the first time that games have had to deal with challenges in this field," Rogge said. "Remember Los Angeles, Seoul and Atlanta where air quality issues were successfully addressed at games time."
Chinese officials announced the city will reserve special lanes on their roadways for Olympic traffic. The country is putting billions of dollars toward new sporting venues and infrastructure developments, which officials say are on schedule.
Officials announced plans to monitor food shipments to the games. The U.S. has halted the import of several food products because of concerns they could contain harmful toxins.
Vice president of the Beijing Olympic Games Organizing Committee Jiang Xiaoyu acknowledged that the city's was preparing for some intense scrutiny from the media.
"We welcome the international media to report objectively and fairly on our preparations, and to offer constructive criticism of our shortcomings," Jiang said. "But we oppose politicizing the games, as that is not in keeping with the Olympic spirit."
The Olympic committee has said the games can be a force for positive change in China, but that it does not have the ability to change China's political institutions.
When China won its bid in 2001 to host the Olympic Games, it pledged to bring its press freedoms up to international standards. Journalists have urged the Olympic committee to hold China to that commitment.
"With one year left before the games begin, China has fallen far short of carrying out its promise to improve press freedom," said Paul Steiger, a Wall Street Journal editor and Chairman of the Committee to Protect Journalists. "China has taken some very laudable steps to ease curbs on foreign journalists, and we're happy for that, but it has failed to do the same for its own journalists here in China."
Steiger also called on China to release the 29 Chinese journalists currently in prison.
On Monday, police detained about a dozen foreign journalists covering a demonstration by the group Reporters Without Borders. Police also arrested six foreign demonstrators who rappelled off the Great Wall with signs calling for independence for Tibet.
Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org. 9(MDAzMjM2NDYzMDEyMzc1Njk5NjAxNzY3OQ001))
