The US government will soon officially announce that it will not send government officials to the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. President Joe Biden will make the diplomatic boycott official this week, and several sources told the news channel.
However, according to CNN, the United States National Security Council, which has discussed the boycott privately, declined to confirm the news on Sunday.
In mid-November, Biden said he was considering a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Games in China. A White House spokesman then explained that the US is especially “seriously concerned” about the human rights situation in Xinjiang. Washington accuses China of genocide against the Uyghurs in that region, but Beijing denies it.
The US government would see a diplomatic boycott as a good way to send a clear message to China without hurting American athletes. In the event of a diplomatic boycott, they can still travel to China and participate in the Games. A diplomatic boycott of the Games threatens to exacerbate further the already existing political tensions between the US and China.
Governments usually send a large delegation of high-ranking diplomats to the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. Due to corona, however, there would be a lot less at the upcoming Winter Games. The Chinese state newspaper Global Times also reported last week that the Chinese government in Beijing has no plans at all to invite American politicians. So the boycott will be largely symbolic.