Berlin (AP) – Chancellor Olaf Scholz has no plans to travel to Beijing for the Winter Olympics. “I don’t have any travel plans, so you can’t assume that I’ll suddenly show up and say: Hello, here I am,” said the SPD politician when asked by ZDF’s “heute journal”.
Scholz had left questions about visiting the Olympic Games unanswered for many weeks. On Wednesday afternoon, government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said in response to a question: “We will inform you promptly about the Chancellor’s trips.” Scholz will certainly not fly to the opening ceremony on Friday. Among others, the Russian President Vladimir Putin, the heads of state of Poland, Serbia, Egypt, Argentina, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan as well as the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia are expected in Beijing.
USA: Diplomatic boycott
The US announced a diplomatic boycott of the games from February 4th to 20th weeks ago. Australia, Canada, Great Britain and New Zealand joined. The background is above all the human rights situation in the most populous country in the world. The leadership in Beijing has been criticized for its dealings with the Muslim Uyghurs in Xinjiang province and the Tibetans, but also for the suppression of the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong and threats against Taiwan.
Scholz had repeatedly emphasized that there was a voting process in the European Union on the issue of the diplomatic boycott. Individual EU countries then gradually committed themselves – and in different ways. President Andrzej Duda wants to travel to the opening ceremony from Poland and Grand Duke Henri from Luxembourg is on the official guest list. The Netherlands, Denmark and the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have opted against sending government officials to Beijing.