IOC: China Must Open Internet for Olympics
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
BEIJING — The Internet must be open during the Beijing Olympics. That was the message a top-ranking International Olympic Committee official delivered yesterday to Beijing organizers during the first of three days of meetings — the last official sessions between IOC inspectors and the Chinese hosts before the games begin in just over four months.
Beijing routinely blocks Chinese access to some foreign news Web sites and blogs, a practice it has stepped up since rioting broke out over two weeks ago in Tibet. The vice chairman of the IOC coordinating commission, Kevan Gosper, said restricting access to the Internet during the games “would reflect very poorly” on the host nation.
