- Friday May See 'Risk Trade' Stalling; Dollar in Focus
- Job Market Politics to Keep Interest Rates Low
- AIG, Symbol of Crisis, Watches Its Stock Zoom Back
- Disney Profit, Sales Top Street Forecasts; Shares Jump
- Bill Gates Praises Apple's Jobs for 'Saving the Company'
- Cities With the Most Home Price Reductions
- Is Euphoric Market Ignoring Warning Signs?
- Video Game Sales Plunge, but Have They Hit Bottom?
- Despite Rhetoric, Obama Has Few Options to Boost Jobs
- EXCERPTS and IMAGES: Warren Buffett & Bill Gates - Keeping America Great
- Microsoft's Bill Gates Praises Apple's Steve Jobs For 'Saving the Company'
- Gold Is a Bad Inflation Hedge—Like Oil: Stock Picker
- Intel's Andy Bryant Offers An Explanation
- US 'Actively Working' on Weaker Dollar: Fund Manager
- Options Boil on Biotech Buyout Rumors
- Warren Buffett's $100,000 Offer and $500,000 Advice for Columbia Business School Students
- Activision Blizzard's "Modern Warfare 2" Sales Break Records
- 5-Star Manager's 5 Stocks for Changing Markets
MOST SHARED
- Warren Buffett and Bill Gates Share Their 'Optimism' With Eager Columbia Business Students
- Pharma & Social Media
- Cities With the Most Home Price Reductions
- China Fourth Quarter Growth Could Hit 10%: Official
- Disney Profit, Sales Top Street Forecasts; Shares Jump
- Microsoft's Bill Gates Praises Apple's Steve Jobs For 'Saving the Company'
- Warren Buffett's $100,000 Offer and $500,000 Advice for Columbia Business School Students
- Is Euphoric Market Ignoring Warning Signs?
- Disney CFO and Parks Chief to Swap Roles
Text Size 
Australia's Mandarin-speaking Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said on Thursday he would attend the Beijing Olympics, ignoring human rights activists' demands that he boycott the event over China's Tibet crackdown.
 |
Lauren Victoria Burke / AP |
Rudd, a former diplomat who served in Beijing and who has been accused at home and abroad of being too close to China, said attending the Games was the "right thing to do".
"I'm pretty relaxed about going. It's the Chinese government (who) have extended an invitation. The Australian Olympic Committee has been supportive of the decision," Rudd told reporters after an Australian team reception in Canberra.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy has refused to rule out the possibility he could boycott the Aug. 8 opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics if China does not make more effort to resolve unrest in Tibet.
Rudd said he was unaware of any diplomatic tension over his decision and quipped that the closest he had ever come to competitive sport as a bookish young diplomat in Beijing was in a local expatriate cricket team.
"There were only 12 Australians in China at the time and I was selected as 12th man (reserve). As our captain said, I never troubled the scorekeepers much," Rudd said. "Australians love sport. Australians love the Olympics and Australians love Australian sportsmen and women representing their country at the Olympics."
China recently overtook Japan as Australia's biggest trading partner and the country is Canberra's biggest customer for energy and mineral exports, with two-way trade worth A$52 billion (US$49 billion) in 2007.
The China-driven boom has rocketed Australians from 15th place in the world in terms of GDP per capita in 1992 to seventh.
Australian Greens Senator Bob Brown said Rudd had turned his back on Tibetans by agreeing to attend the Games opening ceremony, as well as shooting, women's basketball, cycling and diving events.
"It's the wrong thing to do, it's not the right thing to do. The pollution of Beijing strong-arm politics has reached the prime minister's office," Brown said.
Print
Email
- Warren Buffett and Bill Gates spoke to Columbia students, and Buffett made the students a startling offer.
- They may have wrecked their companies or saved our economy. Tell us what you think.
- Big pharma embraces social media, but how much should a tightly regulated sector say on Facebook or Twitter?
- A European dating site finds lovelorn singles from one country to be consistently uglier. Which is it?
- Contributor David Pogue looks at two of the latest efforts to perfect the digital pocket camera.
- PepsiCo is ramping up its onsite health facilities for workers.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes