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Diplomatic boycott of Olympics shows government recognizes human rights atrocities: Longfield

While Wellington-Halton Hills MP Michael Chong, the foreign affairs critic, said further actions are needed
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Michael Chong, Wellington-Halton Hills MP.

OTTAWA – Canada’s diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Olympics in China due to human rights violation concerns is generally supported by local MPs but the foreign affairs critic said the government’s delayed decision is part of a troubling pattern. 

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Canada will be joining allies in a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing because of human rights violations by the Chinese government. 

This means athletes will still compete but no federal government officials will attend the games. 

Guelph’s Liberal MP Lloyd Longfield said the intention of this move is to take the politics out of the Olympics. 

“I think having a diplomatic boycott, as many of our allies have, is showing that the government is recognizing human rights atrocities are still happening in China,” Longfield said. 

“The Olympic ideal is that the athletes of the world get together every four years on a non-political basis on a love of sport and competition. So I think it hits the balance between allowing the Olympic ideal to continue but also recognizing that China is violating human rights.”

Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong, Wellington-Halton Hills MP, said having government officials participate in fanfare and celebration in China would be inappropriate in the context of “China’s belligerence and violation of international law.”

Therefore, he supports the diplomatic boycott but said the government should have made this decision earlier as they were calling for. This is an ongoing problem Chong said he sees with how Canada deals with China.

“We’re still waiting for a decision on Huawei and they haven’t been working with other democratic allies on countering these threats from China,” Chong said, giving examples of Canada’s exclusion from Australian, US and UK defence agreements and not being part of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue.

The diplomatic boycott isn’t the only sanction Canada should take in Chong’s view. He explained the opposition have called on the government for further actions such as banning Huawei from Canada’s telecommunications network and banning the importation of products from China that are produced using forced labour.

Earlier in the year, the House of Commons passed a motion declaring the Chinese government’s actions in the Xinjiang region against the Uyghur Muslims amounts to a genocide. 

The motion also asked for the government to ask the International Olympic Committee to move the upcoming Olympics out of Beijing. 

Trudeau’s cabinet ministers and many Liberal MPs, including Longfield, abstained on the genocide vote. 

Longfield explained officially calling something a genocide is done through an international inquiry. He said he didn’t agree with Parliament usurping that process by going independent and this latest action is more appropriate for the government to take. 

“Diplomatic boycott is something we can do through our own diplomacy, (labelling) a genocide is done through multi-country diplomacy,” Longfield said. 

Chong said he sees this as a disconnect between the government’s rhetoric and reality.

“It’s part of a broader pattern with this government where they are either late in making the decisions or they don’t make decisions at all,” Chong said. “That’s not leadership, that’s an abdication of leadership.”


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Keegan Kozolanka

About the Author: Keegan Kozolanka

Keegan Kozolanka is a general assignment reporter for EloraFergusToday, covering Wellington County. Keegan has been working with Village Media for more than two years and helped launch EloraFergusToday in 2021.
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