Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/ban1olympics041008.html
UNITED NATIONS, April 10 -- Ban Ki-moon is not "in a position to attend this important event," the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Beijing, "due to scheduling issues," his Deputy Spokesperson Marie Okabe answered Inner City Press' question on Thursday. Video here, from Minute 8:45. She declined to answer follow-up questions on what these "scheduling issues" might be, and on when Ban received a formal invitation to attend from the Chinese government.
On April 9, Inner City Press asked Ms. Okabe at the UN's noon briefing, "has the Secretary-General been invited to attend the Beijing Olympics and, if so, what's his response?" Ms. Okabe said, "Yes, he has been invited, but I have nothing to announce today on his travel plans. " Click here for transcript, here for video, from Minute 13:38, and here for yesterday's Inner City Press story.
Inner City Press had been told that China, to counter Ban's position that he would not attend, had issued a formal invitation, with the idea that this would force Ban's hand. Later on Thursday, a South Korean source in the UN indicated that following the noon briefing question, the odds of Ban attending had gone up.
Whereas a visit by Ban to Beijing in connection with the G-8 Summit in Japan on July 7-9 was being floated as the reason not to return to the Far East for the Olympics opening ceremony on August 8, as of Thursday afternoon consideration was being given to scrapping the July side-trips to Beijing and Seoul, and to grant China's wish of Ban's presence at the sure-to-be-contentious Olympic Games.
Other South Korean sources bemoaned that Olympics politics, in this scenario, might preclude Ban's long-awaited visit to Seoul as Secretary-General. Now, with the surprising announcement that Ban will not travel to China for the Olympics, but that according to Ms. Okabe other visits to China are planned, the G-8 Summit trip to Japan may once again be combined with both China and South Korea. We'll see.
News analysis: Ms. Okabe was asked that, since some countries are discussion boycotting the Olympics opening ceremony citing such issues as Tibet, Darfur, Myanmar and China's forced return of asylum seekers from North Korea, did Mr. Ban intend his non-attendance as any type of political message? While one assumes that Ban's ultimate answer to that question will be "no" -- and even that he may reverse himself and end up attending on August 8 -- Mr. Okabe on Thursday replied that the above-quoted was all she had to say on the subject. Watch this space.
