UNION CITY, N.J. – Senate
Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) today
released the following statement following reports that the Biden
Administration will officially impose a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter
Olympics to be held in Beijing, China. The Menendez-authored Strategic
Competition Act, which passed the Senate as part of the comprehensive legislative
package to bolster U.S. competiveness with China, included provisions
requiring a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Olympics in light of the Chinese
government’s human rights abuses in Tibet, the crushing of Hong Kong’s
autonomy, and genocide perpetrated against the Uyghur
people and other ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
(XUAR).
“I welcome reports that
President Biden has decided to impose a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming
Beijing Olympics, which is a powerful rebuke of the Chinese Communist Party’s
campaign of genocide in Xinjiang. As we laid out in our bipartisan U.S.
Innovation and Competition Act, this boycott is a necessary step to demonstrate
our unwavering commitment to human rights in the face of the Chinese
government’s unconscionable abuses. I applaud the Biden administration for
forcefully underscoring that the preservation of human rights is still a
foundational pillar of American foreign policy.
“I also call on other allies
and partners that share our values to join with the United States in this
diplomatic boycott. As the CCP continues with its mass internments, family
separations, forced labor, forced renunciations of faith, and forced
sterilizations, the world must be united in confronting the staggering enormity
of
Beijing’s egregious human rights violations and hold those who perpetuate these
atrocities to account.”
