China stresses security in bid for Olympics
Print Edition
CHINESE officials said yesterday that they can provide a secure environment for a Winter Olympics in Beijing, as International Olympic Committee evaluators wrapped up a five-day inspection tour of the city’s 2022 bid.
Bid official Zhang Jiandong said the Chinese capital had a proven track record in providing security for the millions of visitors and thousands of events the city hosts annually.
“China is a very safe country,” Zhang said at a daily briefing. “The Chinese government has always attached great importance to fighting terrorism and our experience from the 2008 Beijing Olympics has been consistently enhanced.”
Zhang said Beijing’s police would work jointly with state security bodies and cooperate with other countries and Interpol on collecting intelligence and analyzing threats.
Zhang’s comments followed the conclusion of presentations and site inspections by the 19-member IOC evaluation commission, whose members leave today following a closing news conference. They will present their recommendations in a June report.
The inspection is a key test of Beijing’s status as frontrunner in the bid race against Almaty in Kazakhstan. Beijing is also vying to become the first city in history to host both summer and winter Olympics.
The IOC will select the host city on July 31 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
On Thursday, the inspectors visited the Zhangjiakou ski area about 200 kilometers north of the city where Beijing plans to hold the Nordic events, along with free style skiing, snow boarding and biathlon. As a further enticement to television audiences, some of those venues would lie at the base of a western section of the Great Wall.
Although the venues’ distance from Beijing has been a concern, organizers say a high-speed rail line now under construction will reduce the current three-hour travel time to just 50 minutes.
While the air quality in the rural ski venues has not been an issue, Beijing’s notorious pollution reared its ugly head during the visit, with the benchmark PM2.5 air quality reading topping 150 all week, a level more than six times what the World Health Organization considers safe.
Beijing’s bid received a morale boost from former England soccer captain David Beckham, a brand ambassador for China’s top-flight Super League who, along with his fashion designer wife Victoria, is a regular visitor to the city.
“I wish them good luck,” Beckham was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency. “Because I know how passionate the people are in this country for life and for sport, so good luck of course.”
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