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BEIJING (Reuters) – Olympic host Beijing saw hazy pollution lift on Tuesday, but a damning Amnesty International report brought into sharp view tensions over China’s human rights policies ten days before the Games begin.
With the 2008 Olympic Games due to open in the shining Bird’s Nest Stadium on August 8, the human rights group on Tuesday gave a scathing assessment of China’s record, saying many of its citizens’ protections and freedoms have shrunk, not expanded, in the seven years since Beijing won the right to hold the Games.
China had not honoured vows to improve rights that officials made in lobbying for the Games, and was not living up to commitments as an Olympic host, Amnesty International stated in the report released in Hong Kong.
“There has been no progress towards fulfilling these promises, only continued deterioration,” it said in the report, titled “The Olympics countdown – broken promises”.
“The authorities have used the Olympic Games as pretext to continue, and in some respects, intensify existing policies and practices which have led to serious and widespread violations of human rights,” it said in the report released in Hong Kong.
Amnesty said Chinese authorities had targetted human rights defenders, journalists and lawyers to “silence dissent” ahead of the Games, jailing dissidents such as prominent AIDS activist Hu Jia and often intimidating their families.
A Chinese government spokesman dismissed the Amnesty report as a product of habitual bias that ignored big improvements.
“This is a statement that anyone who knows China cannot agree with,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s chief spokesman Liu Jianchao told a news conference in Beijing. “I hope Amnesty International can take off the coloured glasses it has been wearing for years and look at China fairly and objectively.” Continued…
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(Reuters) – Alicia Keys has canceled two shows on her newly launched North American tour because of swollen vocal cords, her record label said on Wednesday.
The 27-year-old R&B singer scrapped Tuesday’s show in Pittsburgh, the third stop of the tour, and has also pulled the plug on Thursday’s concert in Cleveland.
The tour is expected to resume in Columbus on Saturday. Tickets for the Cleveland show will be honored at Columbus, said J Records.
Keys’ tour, to promote her chart-topping album “As I Am,” began last Saturday in Hampton, Va.
Sore throats must be contagious on the tour. One of Keys’ opening acts, 2007 “American Idol” winner Jordin Sparks, has been unable to perform because of an acute vocal cord hemorrhage. Her Jive Records label expected her to join the trek in May.
Dates are on tap through June 18 at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
Reuters/Nielsen
The Bush administration hailed an Iraqi offensive against Shiite militiamen in the southern city of Basra as a “bold decision” that shows the country’s security forces are capable of combating terrorists.
At least 18 people were killed in clashes yesterday between fighters loyal to Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and Iraqi troops, as Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki pledged to restore security in the southern oil hub.
“This is what we have been wanting to see the Iraqis do,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters in Washington yesterday. “This is one of the first times that they’ve had such an entrenched battle and we’ll be there to support them if they need it.”
The fighting is a test for Iraqi forces, who took over responsibility for security in Basra from the U.K. military in December. Iraq’s ability to tackle extremists will influence the pace at which the U.S. withdraws its forces from the country, as the conflict enters its sixth year.
Al-Sadr had repeatedly called on fighters from the militia, the Mahdi Army, to obey a cease-fire declared in August. Some elements of the group continue to target other militias and U.S.-led coalition forces.
Shiite Groups
Shiite groups including al-Sadr’s followers, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council and the Fadhila party have clashed in a struggle for dominance in Basra, the site of Iraq’s second- biggest oil refinery.
Al-Sadr threatened to instigate protests nationwide if the raids by Iraqi forces weren’t stopped. “If the government does not respect these demands, the next step will be civil protests in Baghdad and the provinces,” his spokesman Hazam al-Aaraji said yesterday, reading a statement from the cleric at a news conference in Najaf aired on state television.
Fighting spread late yesterday to Sadr City in eastern Baghdad and Kut and Hilla, south of the capital, Agence France- Presse reported, citing unidentified security officials.
Footage on state television showed plumes of smoke rising above Basra city as police and ambulances raced down otherwise empty streets.
Basra has been plagued by the smuggling of “oil and its derivatives, weapons, drugs and other prohibited materials,” al-Maliki said yesterday in a statement carried by state television. The government “is firmly resolved to restore security and stability and to impose law.”
The U.S. military has said it is open to negotiations with al-Sadr’s followers. Before the cease-fire, the U.S. viewed the Mahdi Army as “the most dangerous accelerant of potentially self-sustaining sectarian violence in Iraq,” the Defense Department said in a 2006 report.
The U.S. has about 158,000 soldiers in Iraq. That force is scheduled to drop to about 140,000 by July.
Bush will announce his decision on future troop levels after General David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, testify before Congress April 8-9, according to the White House.
To contact the reporters on this story: Ed Johnson in Sydney at ejohnson28@bloomberg.net; Robin Stringer in London at rstringer@bloomberg.net.
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