The Biden administration said Monday that US diplomats are going to Beijing to support athletes at the Winter Olympics, but not to attend the Games, after a top Chinese government propagandist claimed that the move shows President Biden’s diplomatic boycott is a “farce.”
The Chinese foreign ministry said Monday it had received at least 18 US applications for diplomatic visas. The South China Morning Post reported that another 40 may come in ahead of the Feb. 4 opening ceremonies.
The State Department and White House National Security Council said late Monday there had been no change to Biden’s “diplomatic boycott.”
“We intend to provide consular and diplomatic security services to ensure our athletes, coaches, trainers, and staff are secure and have access to the American citizen services that we provide to all U.S. citizens overseas,” a statement from the two agencies said.
“Any visa application would be for those consular and diplomatic security personnel. It is standard to have those personnel on the ground, and those personnel do not constitute official or diplomatic representation at the Games.”
The joint statement continued: “Our position we announced earlier this month remains our position and will not be changing: We will not have any diplomatic or official representation given the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China’s] ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang, and other human rights abuses. Any suggestion otherwise is false.”
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian, who is infamous for spreading misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic beginning in the US rather than in Wuhan, said that the diplomatic visas showed Biden’s boycott was a “farce.”
“The US side has recently staged a farce with the goal of political manipulation and claimed that it will not send any diplomatic or official representatives to the Beijing Winter Olympics, even though it has in fact never been invited,” Zhao said.
He added: “We again call on the US side to practice the Olympic spirit, stop politicizing sport and stop making further comments or actions that would interfere with or disrupt the Beijing Winter Olympics.”
White House press secretary Jen Psaki announced the diplomatic boycott earlier this month, specifically citing the mass-detention of predominately Muslim Uyghurs in western China.
“The Biden administration will not send any diplomatic or official representation to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympic Games given the PRC’s ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang, and other human rights abuses,” Psaki said.
Former President Donald Trump said in a recent interview that he agrees with Biden’s decision not to bar athletes from participating in the Games — as President Jimmy Carter did ahead of the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
Trump told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, “I watched Jimmy Carter do it, and it was terrible. [It] hurts the athletes. There are much more powerful things we can do that — much, much more powerful things.”
So far, Biden has kept many of Trump’s policies toward China in place, including tariffs on Chinese goods and sanctions on Chinese Communist officials for eliminating Hong Kong’s autonomy and mistreating Uyghurs.
But Biden has seemed to apply a soft touch on other matters sensitive to the Chinese government. For example, he didn’t press Chinese President Xi Jinping for transparency on the origins of COVID-19 during a 3 1/2 hour virtual summit last month.
Biden later smiled and walked away after listening to a question from The Post about why he hasn’t done more to push China for transparency on the origins of the pandemic after 800,000 US deaths.
The US intelligence community said in August that it’s possible the virus leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, calling the theory one of two “plausible” explanations, in addition to a natural transfer from animals to humans.
Trump claimed to Bartiromo that Biden hasn’t pressed China on coronavirus origins because “he’s afraid of” Xi due to his son Hunter Biden’s business interests in China.
“So they have something on him?” Bartiromo asked.
“Yeah. Of course they do,” said Trump, who is teasing a 2024 presidential election rematch against Biden.
A 2017 email recovered from Hunter Biden’s laptop described a 10 percent set-aside for “the big guy” as part of a prospective deal involving a Chinese energy company. Former Hunter Biden business partner Tony Bobulinski said Joe Biden was the “big guy.”
Hunter Biden’s attorney Chris Clark said last month — less than a week after his father’s summit with Xi — that the first son divested a 10 percent stake in a different Chinese company called BHR Partners, an investment fund controlled by Chinese state-owned entities.
BHR Partners was registered 12 days after Hunter joined then-Vice President Biden aboard Air Force Two for a 2013 trip to Beijing. The entity was influential in facilitating a 2016 deal in which a Chinese company bought a Congolese cobalt mine from US and Canadian companies. Cobalt is a key material for electric car batteries.
The first son’s lawyer has provided no information on the divestment, including the identity of the person or entity that acquired his stake, the date of the transaction and the dollar amount. Psaki recently said the White House would not be providing details on the transaction and referred The Post to Hunter’s attorney, who did not respond to requests for information.
