The Olympics as a political weapon

A photograph taken in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, on 28 March 2024, shows a view of the headquarters of the Organising Committee of the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games - PHOTO/JOEL SAGET/AFP

Pedro Canales

19 de abril de 2024 (06:00 h.)

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The upcoming Olympic Games, the XXXIII of the Modern Era, which will take place in Paris between 26 July and 11 August, are once again showing their character as a political instrument in the hands of the world's power elite to maintain control over the 193 member countries of the United Nations.

The Olympic Games (OG) are not alien to world geopolitics; they do not obey the principles of equality and twinning between peoples, over and above quarrels, armed clashes, forced mass migrations and human rights violations. The Olympic Games are not, as their organisers would have us believe, the pure expression of sport and human endeavour, but political weapons of pressure. And, therefore, their organisation and development obey the double yardstick. Some countries are welcomed, others reviled, depending on the opinion of those behind the International Olympic Committee and the national committees, as well as the organising country, in the case of the XXXIII Olympic Games in France.

If, as the President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach, has assured us, politics has no influence on the Games, why will Russian and Belarusian teams and athletes only be able to participate if they agree to play the role of pariahs? They will not be able to represent their country, they will have no flag, no anthem, and they will parade incognito. They will be Frantz Fanon's new "damned of the earth".

Because Russia started a war of aggression in 2022, which is still going on, by invading Ukraine", say the leaders. So why not apply the same yardstick to Israel, which is waging an atrocious war in Gaza, killing old people, women and children? Why not apply the same criteria to Myanmar, Afghanistan, Burundi or Cambodia?

Russia's war against Ukraine is condemned by a large part of the international community, though not all of it. Israel's war against Gaza, too, and even by part of the Israeli population and the Jewish diaspora around the world. But what is true for Moscow is not true for Tel Aviv.

Unlike sports tournaments, artistic displays and most championships, participants and teams do so in an individual capacity. In the Olympic Games, on the other hand, it is the countries that are represented, that parade, that compete for medals. In the name of what principles can athletes be forced to disown their flags and condemn in public what their political leaders do? It is an aberration, to say the least, to judge participants by their political views.

Many countries in the world which are going to participate in the Olympic Games and which will parade with their teams and flags along the Seine in Paris are ruled by bloody dictators who systematically violate the human rights of their people and curtail fundamental rights and freedoms. They will take part, and their autocrats, often resulting from bloody coups d'état, will be on the rostrum as guests of honour.

And what about the countries that for centuries have dominated hundreds of millions of Asians, Africans and Americans? Have they declared their remorse for their colonial pasts? These same countries, including Olympic host France, never had any obstacles or conditions imposed on their participation, even in the most abhorrent Olympic Games in history, those organised by Adolf Hitler in 1936 in Berlin.

It would not be surprising if Russian and Belarusian teams and athletes decide to withdraw from the competitions, not because they support the war in Ukraine, nor out of devotion to the Russian and Belarusian presidents, Vladimir Putin and Aleksander Lukashenko, but out of decency and dignity towards their compatriots, whom they know they represent.