Absurdity, Allegory and China

The lead-up to the Beijing Olympics continues to be handled, as expected, poorly. With Beijing filling up with international reporters who have been falsely promised unrestricted access to Chinese citizens, the public security officials continue to do what they have always done. Earlier this week, Thursday evening, March 6, the NYT reported that Teng Biao, a Chinese rights lawyer, was snatched after he had called his wife to tell her he’d be home in 20 minutes. He was muscled into an unmarked black vehicle outside his home and a hood was placed over his head. A day-and-a-half later he was released, but for reasons only he knows and we can only imagine, he’s not talking about his time as a reluctant guest of the Public Security Bureau.

Chinese security forces are known to use unmarked black vehicles to snatch their marks off the street, which recalls Argentina’s secret police use of Ford Falcons as the car of choice for kidnapping their citizenry during the dirty wars of the late 70s and early 80s that saw the disappearance of thousands of citizens who were guilty of nothing more than not sharing the same views as the ruling class.

It is not coincidental that Mr. Teng has ties to Hu Jia, the high profile activist who was taken into custody on December 27, 2007 after 214 days under house arrest. While he was under house arrest he and his wife, Zeng Jianyan, had continued to publicize the case of petitioners, peasants who lost their lands, arrested dissidents and other victims of injustice. They were also able to post films of the guards outside their flat, an unflattering look at the daily habits of the state security guys and their daily routine – smoking, eating and sleeping in their trash – which also included the constant badgering of Ms. Zeng whenever she tried to leave. She is now under house arrest, and leaving is no longer an option. Her plight as well as that of her newborn child continues to be an ongoing embarrassment to the government. Speculation is that she will eventually be arrested too, since her apartment in Freedom City continues to be the focal point of international press interest.

Along with the human rights problem, the quality of Beijing air continues to make headlines. Despite the ‘rash’ of blue sky days through January and February, which is often the case in the midst of Beijing winters, things turned sour again yesterday, with the traditional smog on the rise again as the winds have died down. Though it is spring in northern China, the winds that will be coming will be bringing in the Gobi Desert in the form of sandstorms as it always does in March, April and May, and this seasons is predicted to be a bad one this year. This morning in Tianjin, another Olympic venue a short 100 kilometers away from the capital, the skies are ‘fogged,’ and there’s no pimping this one off on sandstorms. A quick call to Beijing, where I woke up yesterday in the soup, confirms that the blue sky winter is in full retreat.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Jacques Rogge continues to maintain his ‘deck chairs on the Titanic’ charade regarding both the human rights situation and the air quality issues, as these incidents proved to not go away. China’s promises to the IOC that awarding the Games would facilitate human rights progress as well as their much touted policy of allowing greater press access to international media has also turned out to be a great stretch of what any sensible person would understand to be a truth.

Last month a German news team was accosted by the security personnel assigned to watch Yuan Weijing, the wife of imprisoned blind activist Chen Guangcheng, when they attempted to interview her in Shandong province. This was just another of the many instances when Chinese security people have restricted press access in this age of supposed openness.

Also last month, February 2, 2008, a story in Xinhua: IOC official dismisses pollution worries over Beijing Games claimed that R. Kevan Gosper, Vice-Chairman of the IOC Coordination Commission for the Beijing Games and an IOC member, who was in Beijing for the debut event for the Water Cube, the site of the Olympic swimming events, “dismissed worries over air pollution in Beijing and reaffirmed confidence that the local organizers will ensure healthy atmosphere for athletes and spectators during the 2008 Summer Olympics.” After a closer reading of the article, Mr. Gospar’s quotes don’t say that at all. No big surprise here. State media, always on a short leash as they attempt to keep everyone else on an even shorter one, continue to say anything to get their message out, which is always one that supports the view from Heaven rather than the reality on the ground. With that said, I continue to scratch my head when I read stories like the following :

[Jacques] Rogge said Saturday that Beijing is making big strides in clearing up its notoriously bad air quality, which has been a major concern for both the International Olympic Committee and leading athletes. In an interview with the Associated Press, Rogge also reiterated his stance that the IOC should not be pressuring China about its human rights record, and praised the growing number of women who will compete in games.

The mentioning of women in his answer to the human rights question is a low-ball dodge as Rogge and his IOC continue to take it on the chin. But don’t feel bad for the IOC, who deserve all the bad press they can possibly get. When they are used by the Chinese media to further spin the official story, one cannot help but find justice in it. They are hardly unwilling accomplices in the overall deceit of this venture. They hopped into bed with these characters, and what they should have learned – though apparently didn’t – from Salt Lake City was that ‘protection’ is a requisite when rolling in the sheets with the potentially diseased. And since diseases of this sort are not visibly apparent, one has to always err on the side of condoms.

The IOC fell on their collective faces back in 2002, and from observing how they have been worked by Beijing and their promises, which are broken on a regular basis, one can only conclude that they did not learn much from the fall. There is a good reason to build checks and balances into long-term agreements, but apparently the IOC has been unable to learn that simple lesson. So, set out more chairs on the sinking ship and strap Jacques Rogge and his colleagues into the heaviest ones. It’s going to be a great day up on deck. Trust me, the ship isn’t sinking. Really, it’s not.

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