HRF & Lantos to Democracies: Leave Your Olympic Box Seats Empty in Protest

NEW YORK (January 4, 2022) — With the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics one month away, the Human Rights Foundation (HRF) and the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights & Justice (Lantos Foundation) call on democratic governments to commit to a diplomatic boycott of the Games, and refuse to send official representation. By leaving their box seats empty, particularly at the marquee event of the Opening Ceremonies, democratic nations can send a powerful message in support of fundamental human rights.

Authoritarian regimes have historically weaponized global sporting events, such as the Olympics, to whitewash their human rights abuses. The glitz and glamor of such events has drowned out the suffering of millions of people living under dictatorships, and allows these authoritarian regimes — among them, China’s regime — to grandstand on the world stage alongside leaders from democratic countries. With Xi Jinping at its helm, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has belligerently attacked fundamental human rights in Tibet, the Uyghur Region (Xinjiang), and Hong Kong, and has unleashed its economic might to silence critics globally.

As a response to the CCP’s abuses, in December 2021, the Biden Administration announced a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Olympics in China, which are scheduled to take place from February 4-20. Among the human rights violations specified by the Biden administration, were China’s mass detention camps in the Uyghur Region (Xinjiang) and its campaign of forced sterilization against the Uyghurs. Several other countries, including Canada, Australia, Lithuania, and the United Kingdom have also announced diplomatic boycotts, similarly citing China’s appalling human rights record and the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“The Olympics, which aim to unify nations and promote shared values like respect for human dignity, must not be weaponized as a stage for China’s authoritarian government to whitewash its abuses. The very least that governments can do, is to show their solidarity with the people of Tibet, the Uyghur Region, and Hong Kong by leaving their seats empty at the Olympic Games,” said HRF President Céline Assaf-Boustani. “We applaud the governments that have already committed to diplomatic boycotts, and we encourage all other countries that value human rights, justice, and the rule of law to follow suit. It is imperative for the global community to stand together to send a powerful message to the CCP that its human rights abuses will not be tolerated.” 

With its appalling human rights record, Beijing should never have been given the opportunity to become the first city in history to host both the Summer and Winter Olympic Games. However, despite international public outcry against the host country’s abuses and the diplomatic boycott commitments already made by democratic governments, the 2022 Olympics appear poised to go ahead as planned. 

“The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has demonstrated its utter disregard for human rights by awarding Beijing the Olympics, even though its human rights violations have only grown in severity since Beijing last hosted the Summer Games in 2008,” said President of the Lantos Foundation Katrina Lantos Swett. “The IOC may be willing to overlook the CCP’s misdeeds, but the international community cannot, and must not. Countries around the world can make known their support for the human rights and dignity of all people by refusing to dignify the 2022 Winter Olympics, which some have dubbed the ‘Genocide Games,’ with official representation.”

As HRF and the Lantos Foundation join forces in their condemnation of China’s human rights violations and calls for diplomatic boycotts of the Olympics, it is more important than ever that the international community boldly take a stand against the CCP over its shameless disregard for human rights and the rule of law. 

More information about HRF and the Lantos Foundation’s “Empty Box” Campaign, urging governments to leave their Olympic box seats empty in peaceful protest, is available here. 

To learn more about how the Olympics can legitimize the rule of authoritarian regimes, read HRF CEO Thor Halvorssen and Lantos Foundation President Katrina Lantos Swett’s op-ed, Don’t Let Dictators Grandstand with World Leaders in Tokyo. Reclaim Olympics Values.

The Human Rights Foundation (HRF) is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that promotes and protects human rights globally, with a focus on closed societies. For interview requests of further comment, please e-mail media@hrf.org.

The Lantos Foundation for Human Rights & Justice was established to carry forward the legacy of Congressman Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever elected to the U.S. Congress and a leading human rights champion. The Foundation works with a range of partners on issues that span the globe, with a focus on rule of law and religious freedom. For media requests, please e-mail Chelsea Hedquist at chelsea@lantosfoundation.org.

Investing in internet freedom supports human rights, national security

Today, The Hill featured our op-ed, "Investing in internet freedom supports human rights, national security". The powerful message outlines the importance of US government support to help tear down the digital "Iron Curtain" of the 21st century.

"It is time for the BBG and the State Department to do their jobs and help to tear down these walls by funding the brave dissident innovators who have created the powerful technology tools that help their fellow dissidents struggling behind the digital curtains that mimic the “Iron Curtain” of another era. It is long past time for the excuses, delays, obfuscation and denials of the D.C. bureaucrats to come to an end." - Katrina Lantos Swett, Lantos Foundation President

Read the full op-ed here.

Lantos Foundation Announces Affiliation with Human Rights Activist Chen Guangcheng

Chinese Dissident to be Senior Advisor on Internet Freedom and Human Rights for People with Disabilities

The Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice was enormously proud to award Chen Guangcheng the 2012 Lantos Prize – our Foundation’s highest honor.

This distinguished award is presented each year to a global figure who has shown extraordinary courage and leadership in the struggle for human rights. Mr. Chen was a particularly worthy recipient of the Lantos Prize. In the face of threats, persecution, and imprisonment, Guangcheng has demonstrated truly remarkable tenacity. His advocacy has spanned the spectrum of human rights concerns in China - encompassing the rights of persons with disabilities, environmental protection, women’s rights, democracy promotion, and internet freedom.

Like our founder, the late Congressman Tom Lantos, the breadth of Mr. Chen's human rights leadership, and the fearless way he has taken on critical human rights causes, regardless of the odds is admirable. 

These two men share another quality in common-fierce independence. Anyone who knew Tom Lantos understood that he was always his own man.  These brave human rights leaders are kindred spirits. Congressman Lantos never hesitated to make common cause with his colleagues of the right and the left when it was in defense of human rights. Tom Lantos passionately believed that the fight for human rights transcends the more prosaic political battles that occupy so much of our attention and rather than let ideological differences derail his advocacy for universal rights, he viewed human rights work as an opportunity to bring people together on the common ground of our shared values.  Chen Guangcheng embodies a similar spirit of independence and inclusion.

While Chen Guangcheng has become an icon of the global human rights movement, he is also an active leader and voice on behalf of literally tens of millions of Chinese citizens who are seeking to exercise the most basic freedoms of speech, conscience, assembly, and self-government. The Lantos Foundation is grateful that he has had the opportunity to pursue his work through NYU and we welcome his decision to continue this work at Catholic University and the Witherspoon Institute. We are also pleased to announce that Mr. Chen will bring his expertise and deep understanding to the Lantos Foundation where he will join us as a Distinguished Senior Advisor focused on Internet freedom and human rights for people with disabilities. We would also like to announce that later this fall Guangcheng will be a guest lecturer at the Rudman Center for Justice, Leadership and Public Policy at the UNH School of Law. We look forward to this and future collaborations.

Katrina Lantos Swett Op-Ed : CNN World/GPS -- Time to tear down the internet 'walls'

The following op-ed appeared on CNN World/GPS on June 26, 2013.

Fifty years ago today, on June 26, 1963, President John F. Kennedy stood in West Berlin and condemned the newly erected Berlin Wall. Twenty-four years later, President Ronald Reagan traveled to West Berlin and challenged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to "tear down this wall.”

In the decades between these speeches, human rights and religious freedom advocates behind the Iron Curtain defied the walls of tyranny by relying on the samizdat, a clandestine system to print and distribute government-suppressed material. Today, many use the internet in much the same way, raising both challenges and opportunities as the forces of repression and freedom clash in the virtual and physical worlds.

To read the entire op-ed please visit CNN World/ GPS