31 March 2008
Some European leaders will not attend opening of Beijing Olympics
(The Times) German chancellor, Angela Merkel, will not attend the Olympics in Beijing, neither will Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany's foreign minister, nor Wolfgang Schäuble, the interior minister responsible for sport. While announcing that German leaders were staying away from Beijing, Steinmeier denied they were boycotting or staging a political protest against the Chinese military and police campaign in Tibet and surrounding areas. While expressing scepticism about a complete boycott, he did not rule one out. "This is not the right moment to talk about a boycott (...) We should watch how the Chinese government deals with the situation in the next weeks and months". French President Nicolas Sarkozy makes his participation dependent from further developments. Donald Tusk, Poland's prime minister, was the first EU head of government to announce a boycott and he was promptly joined by President Václav Klaus of the Czech Republic, who had previously promised to travel to Beijing.