Monday, November 5, 2007

Will half of the world boycott the 2008 Beijing Olympics?

True Discernment links to a report from the Catholic News Agency:

Organize[r]s of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing have published a list of “prohibited objects” in the Olympic village where athletes will stay. To the surprise of many, Bibles are among the objects that will not be allowed.

Now this in itself only alarms certain people, but the article goes on:

According to the Italian daily La Gazzetta dello Sport, organizers have cited “security reasons” and have prohibited athletes from bearing any kind of religious symbol at Olympic facilities.

Not just Christian symbols - religious symbols. Does this mean that Qurans are also banned? Still haven't found the list, but I wouldn't be surprised:

Experts say the terrorist threat to the Aug. 8-24, 2008, Olympics is relatively low, but they warn that Beijing faces a growing threat from Islamic separatists among the Uighur population in the western region of Xinjiang.

However, only one or two terrorist groups are capable of attacks in northeast Asia, and their ability to operate within China's tightly controlled society is very limited, said Rohan Gunaratna, author of "Inside al-Qaida _ Global Network of Terror."

"The threat (to the Beijing Olympics) is medium to low. The threat from the outside is very low," said Gunaratna, who is based in Singapore.

He warned, however, that China's counterterrorism capabilities remain relatively weak, especially in its understanding of groups based outside its borders. "I expect they'll improve a lot before the Olympics," he said.


And if the Quran is banned during the Olympics - what next?

[8 NOV 2007 - UPDATE ON THE UNNAMED ITALIAN JOURNALIST AND THE SINGULAR VS. PLURAL SENSATION.]

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

There is no list. Not in the Italian Newspaper. Not on the Beijing Olympics official documents page. Not anywhere but on Christian blogs and only then this spurious reference to the Bible being banned in China, which is not news. Please verify before you publish.

Ontario Emperor said...

Which is why I wrote the following post, although at this point I don't know whether there's a list or not. The Beijing Olympics hasn't denied it yet.