German chancellor Angela Merkel: 'Nein' to China Olympics

By M&C People Mar 29, 2008, 20:59 GMT

German Chancellor Angela Merkel EPA/URIEL SINAI

German chancellor Angela Merkel will not attend the upcoming Summer Beijing Olympics.

Ms. Merkel became one of the first world leaders to decide not to attend the Olympics in Beijing.

The Guardian (UK) reports that the EU leaders will discuss the Tibet-China crisis for the first time today, in their efforts to decide whether to boycott the Olympics.

President Nicolas Sarkozy of France is rumored to side with Merkel in defiance of the British PM Gordon Brown's attending of the Olympics.

Poland's prime minister, Donald Tusk and President Václav Klaus of the Czech Republic will also not travel to Beijing, according to the Guardian.

"The presence of politicians at the inauguration of the Olympics seems inappropriate," Tusk said. "I do not intend to take part."

Brown is to meet the Tibetan spiritual leader when he visits Britain in May, but is determined to be in Beijing.

China is bristling under Western media exposing their one-party political system, human rights abuses, treatment of the mentally ill and minorities and state controlled media.  The additional embarrassment of Steven Spielberg pulling out as artistic director of the Olympic games over their Darfur connections also is a sore point.