[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 16 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>






117th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. CON. RES. 16

Urging that the International Olympic Committee rebid the 2022 Olympic 
  Winter Games, and expressing the sense of Congress that the United 
  States Olympic & Paralympic Committee should not participate if the 
 Games are held in the People's Republic of China and that the United 
States Government should lead an international boycott if the Games are 
    held in the People's Republic of China, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           February 11, 2021

Mr. Reschenthaler submitted the following concurrent resolution; which 
 was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and in addition to 
the Committee on Oversight and Reform, for a period to be subsequently 
   determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such 
 provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

                         CONCURRENT RESOLUTION


 
Urging that the International Olympic Committee rebid the 2022 Olympic 
  Winter Games, and expressing the sense of Congress that the United 
  States Olympic & Paralympic Committee should not participate if the 
 Games are held in the People's Republic of China and that the United 
States Government should lead an international boycott if the Games are 
    held in the People's Republic of China, and for other purposes.

Whereas, in 2015, the International Olympic Committee announced Beijing, the 
        capital city of the People's Republic of China, as the host city of the 
        2022 Olympic Winter Games;
Whereas the Olympic charter states the goal of Olympism is to promote ``a 
        peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity'';
Whereas, according to the September 2020 House of Representatives China Task 
        Force Report, the Government of China is the leading human rights abuser 
        in the world, depriving 1,400,000,000 human beings of their fundamental 
        rights;
Whereas, since 2017, the Government of China has detained and persecuted up to 
        1,800,000 Turkic Muslims, including ethnic Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and Kyrgyz, 
        in ``political re-education'' centers, and many detainees who have not 
        ``graduated'' from the facilities have been convicted of formal crimes 
        and sentenced to prison terms;
Whereas detained and imprisoned Muslim minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur 
        Autonomous Region are held arbitrarily and without due process, coerced 
        to disavow religious beliefs and cultural practices, forced to work in 
        factories, deprived of food and other essential needs, and subjected to 
        physical abuse, including torture and alleged organ harvesting;
Whereas the Government of China is implementing a policy of employing large 
        numbers of Uyghurs, including former detainees, in labor-intensive 
        factories in Xinjiang and elsewhere in China under forced labor 
        conditions;
Whereas the Government of China has implemented policies against minority groups 
        in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to lower birth rates, including 
        forced abortions, sterilizations, and contraception;
Whereas according to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, an estimated 
        8,500 mosques have been demolished in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
        Region, and nearly 30 percent of Islamic shrines, cemeteries, and other 
        sites of religious importance in the region have been damaged or 
        destroyed, mostly since 2017;
Whereas Article 2 of the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and 
        Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which both the United States and 
        China have ratified, defines genocide as ``any of the following acts 
        committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, 
        ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) killing members of the 
        group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the 
        group; (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life 
        calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 
        (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [or] 
        (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.'';
Whereas, on January 19, 2021, the Department of State determined that the 
        Government of China, under the direction and control of the Chinese 
        Communist Party, ``has committed genocide against the predominantly 
        Muslim Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minority groups in 
        Xinjiang'', and on the same day, Secretary of State Antony Blinken 
        agreed, stating, ``forcing men, women and children into concentration 
        camps, trying to in effect re-educate them to be adherents to the 
        Chinese Communist Party--all of that speaks to an effort to commit 
        genocide'';
Whereas, in June 2020, the legislature of China passed a national security law 
        for Hong Kong restricting basic political rights and authorizing severe 
        punishments for anyone inside or outside Hong Kong found guilty of broad 
        vaguely defined crimes, effectively ending the longstanding ``one 
        country, two systems'' policy;
Whereas, in September 2020, the House Foreign Affairs Committee Minority Staff 
        Report on the origins of the COVID-19 global pandemic found that--

    (1) authorities in China harassed, detained, and disappeared 
individuals who told the truth about the Chinese Communist Party's handling 
of the COVID-19 pandemic;

    (2) during the early outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government 
of China failed to meet an international legal requirement to inform the 
World Health Organization of the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, Hubei 
Province, China;

    (3) during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government of 
China knew of the deadly human-to-human transmission capabilities of the 
virus and took steps to hide it from the public and global community; and

    (4) in February 2020, the Government of China nationalized their 
medical supply chain to stockpile personal protective equipment and stop 
foreign exports to other countries battling the COVID-19 pandemic;

Whereas, in October 2020, United Kingdom Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab stated, 
        regarding a potential boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics due to human 
        rights violations against the Uyghurs, that ``my instinct is to separate 
        sport from diplomacy and politics, but there comes a point where that 
        may not be possible'';
Whereas, in September 2020, an international coalition of human rights 
        organizations wrote to the International Olympic Committee requesting 
        the committee ``reverse its mistake in awarding Beijing the honor of 
        hosting the Winter Olympic Games in 2022'';
Whereas, in November 2020, the Australian Parliament debated a motion calling on 
        the ``Australian Government to work with the Australian Olympic 
        Committee to ensure Australia boycotts the 2022 Winter Olympics games in 
        Beijing'';
Whereas, in January 2020, the editorial board of The Washington Post opposed the 
        Government of China hosting the 2022 Winter Olympics and stated, ``the 
        world must ask whether China, slowly strangling an entire people, has 
        the moral standing to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. We think 
        not.'';
Whereas, in 1980, in H. Con. Res. 249, the House of Representatives voted 386 to 
        12, and the Senate voted 88 to 4, to urge the United States Olympic 
        Committee to propose the transfer or cancellation of the 1980 Summer 
        Olympics in Moscow; to urge the International Olympic Committee to adopt 
        such a proposal; and, if the International Olympic Committee rejected 
        the proposal, to urge the United States Olympic Committee and those of 
        other countries not to participate in the Games and to conduct 
        alternative games of their own, due to concerns over the Soviet Union's 
        invasion of Afghanistan; and
Whereas since the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, the human rights record 
        and global authoritarian influence of China have severely worsened and 
        do not meet the values of Olympism: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), 
That Congress--
            (1) supports the achievements of the athletes, coaches, and 
        personnel of the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee;
            (2) affirms the values and goals of Olympism;
            (3) urges the International Olympic Committee to rebid the 
        2022 Winter Olympics to a country that recognizes and respects 
        human rights;
            (4) calls on the United States Olympic & Paralympic 
        Committee to support human rights and boycott the 2022 Winter 
        Olympics if held in the People's Republic of China; and
            (5) calls on the Administration to support international 
        efforts toward a boycott of the 2022 Olympic Winter Games if 
        they are held in China.
                                 <all>