IOC orders China to unblock Mageek's Bog

BEIJING HAS BEEN told by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that the Internet must be open and uncensored for the entire duration of the Olympic games this summer.

Censorship of the Internet is commonplace in China, with the government regularly blocking content considered either politically subversive or pornographic. These include human rights web sites and dens of seditious rumourmongering such as Mad Mike Mageek’s bog.

China also denies anonymity to Internet café users, who are forced to present their identification before being allowed to log on to the Net.

But the IOC has made it clear that they are having none of China’s shenanigans during their special holy month of sport and said that they have told the Chinese in no uncertain terms that Beijing is committed by its "host city contract" to giving the 30,000 media expected for the Olympics all the freedoms of reporting that they have had in previous Games.

Kevan Gosper, vice chairman of the IOC coordination commission and chairman of the IOC's press commission told journalists: “we discussed and insisted again .... that the Internet is open at all times during Games time". So the Chinese people can supposedly look forward to three weeks of all they can digest Internet porn and politics between August 8-24, until the lycra clad crowd leaves them to suffer repression once more.

Gosper reckoned that if the Chinese authorities blocked or censored the Internet during the Games it "would reflect very poorly" on them as host country. He did believe, however, that the Chinese would comply with the IOC’s requests and fulfill the obligations of their agreement. Indeed. Just like they complied with their January 1^st laws supposedly lifting restrictions on foreign press but then not allowing them in to Tibet to cover the riots taking place there.

The IOC has declined to comment about China's actions in Tibet, saying that it was concerned with sports, not politics. µ

L’Inq
Reuters

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