A group identifying itself as the Turkistan Islamic Party released an anty-Olympics video warning Muslims to stay away from the Olympic Games in Beijing. The Washington-based IntelCenter, which monitors extremists, ...
BEIJING - China declared yesterday it was ready to stage one of the greatest Olympics ever, but a new terrorist threat, continuing concerns about air quality and human rights controversies hung over the final preparations.
As the world's best athletes poured into Beijing and the Olympic flame passed over the Great Wall, Games organizers sought to shift global attention to the opening ceremonies and what they promised would be a sports spectacular.
"We have prepared for the Beijing Olympics for seven years and now we are ready ... we are very confident indeed that we will stage a successful Olympics," said Sun Weide, a spokesman for the organizing committee. "Of course we hope that these will be a great Games, even the greatest."
For China, the Games are an opportunity to show the world how far it has come since the communists came to power in 1949 after a brutal civil war, and particularly the past three decades of phenomenal development.
But the array of controversies that have swirled around the Olympics this year continue to bedevil the Chinese leadership, from the smog that stubbornly hung over Beijing yesterday to conflict between China and the West over human rights.
The danger of a terrorist attack during the Games was underlined yesterday when a Muslim separatist group in China made a video threat warning Muslims to keep their children away from the Games. The Washington-based IntelCenter, which monitors extremists, said the nearly six-minute video shows flames consuming a Beijing Olympics logo and an explosion over a venue for the competition. It featured a masked, turbaned speaker clutching an assault rifle.
The SITE Intelligence Group said the speaker identified himself as a member of the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), and warned Muslims: "Do not stay on the same bus, on the same train, on the same plane, in the same buildings, or any place the Chinese are."
The TIP is an ethnic Uighur and Muslim organization seeking to create an independent state out of China's heavily Muslim Xinjiang province.
In July, the IntelCenter said the group had taken credit in another video statement for a deadly bus bombing in Shanghai in May and warned of new attacks in China during the Olympics.
More than 100,000 security personnel are patrolling Beijing, anti-missile barriers have been set up near the Bird's Nest Olympic stadium, and the military and police are on guard around the country.
Meanwhile, a defiant grey pall hung over Beijing yesterday, and the city's air-pollution index continued to inch up, as it has all week, despite a series of dramatic measures intended to cut contamination.
Chinese officials, the head of the International Olympic Committee and some athletes tried to play down concerns about air pollution. IOC chairman Jacques Rogge called the haze "fog" and said that it wouldn't harm athletes. But the city's air-pollution index stood at levels that were more than six times what the World Health Organization recommends for long-term exposure.
The pollution has been particularly embarrassing for China because it has highlighted to the world one of the worst side-effects of its historic modernization drive -- massive environmental degradation.
China's human rights record remained under the Olympic spotlight, with more than 40 athletes due to compete in Beijing sending a letter to President Hu Jintao expressing their concern over the issue.
U. S. President George W. Bush arrived in Beijing after delivering a speech in which he raised "deep concerns" about China's respect for human rights.
"The United States believes the people of China deserve the fundamental liberty that is the natural right of all human beings," Mr. Bush said in Thailand, triggering an indignant response from Beijing.
"We firmly oppose any words and deeds that use human rights and religion to interfere in other countries' internal affairs," said a spokesman for China's Foreign Ministry.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy yesterday sent Chinese authorities a list of names of human rights activists and prisoners he shows concern for, ahead of his visit for the Olympic Games opening.
Mr. Sarkozy sent the letter in the name of the 27-nation European Union, which he currently leads under the bloc's rotating presidency.
"I can tell you that face to face he'll say what France's values are and what targets we expect from the Chinese government in terms of human rights," said Jean-Pierre Raffarin, a senator and former prime minister who is accompanying Mr. Sarkozy to China. "We'll do it face to face; it's the Asian rule for dialogue."
More than 100 heads of state and other senior national leaders are expected to attend the Games.
