Beijing Winter Olympics sponsors not utilising platform to talk about human rights: HRW

The silence of sponsors of Beijing’s Winter Olympics on the topic of human rights abuses in China is concerning, Human Rights Watch said on Friday.

Companies such as Intel, Omega, Panasonic, Samsung, Toyota, Visa, Airbnb, Coca-Cola, Allianz and Alibaba are the corporate sponsors of the Winter Olympics which are scheduled to begin in Beijing in less than 100 days.

New York-based Human Rights Watch is concerned that the corporate sponsors are not utilising their position and the timing in the best possible way. The group is urging the sponsors to use this platform to highlight the human rights violations and abuses taking place in China under the rule of Xi Jinping.

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"There are just three months until the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, but corporate sponsors remain silent over how they are using their influence to address China’s appalling human rights record," said Sophie Richardson, HRW's China director.

Richardson also warned that sponsors that by not speaking out about the human rights abuses in China, these companies "risk instead being associated with an Olympics tainted by censorship and repression".

HRW experts also revealed that they had earlier written to the sponsors about speaking against the human rights violations in the country, but had received only one response.

Activists and international leaders have accused XI Jinping’s government of religiously repressing the Uyghur minority in Xinjiang. China has also been accused of suppressing Hong Kong, Taiwan and Tibet’s rights, with the locals of those areas often protesting over China’s harsh policies.

China, however, has slammed these accusations and have called it "politicisation" of sport. Talking on the same tune, the International Olympic Committee has claimed that it does not have the power "to go into a country andtell them what to do".