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In this mailing:
* Gordon G. Chang: China's 'Morally Bankrupt' Olympics
* Amir Taheri: Wounds With a Russian Knife in Them


** China's 'Morally Bankrupt' Olympics ([link removed])
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by Gordon G. Chang • November 21, 2021 at 6:00 am
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* The disappearance of tennis star Peng Shuai this month has led many around the world to question the holding of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. The Games are scheduled to begin February 4.
* It is now time for the world to face the reality of the Communist Party of China and the horrific system it has constructed. There is only one correct choice: Move the Games.
* [T]he regime will make Peng publicly retract accusations or destroy her. The individual means nothing in China's current system. Too many times state television has aired ghastly confessions of obviously worn-down individuals.
* There are many reasons to boycott or move the Olympics from Beijing.... Of course, no ruling group that organizes rape, slavery, mass detention, torture, killings, and organ harvesting should be permitted, among other things, to host international sporting events.
* The International Olympic Committee maintains these atrocities are none of its business. Yet the protection of athletes is. Peng's detention tells us athletes will not be safe in China. The Games, after all, are first and foremost about the competitors, and their personal safety must be the primary concern.
* Even at this late date, it is time to boycott or move the Games from China.

The disappearance this month of tennis star Peng Shuai (pictured) has led many around the world to question the holding of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. Now, only the morally bankrupt could think it is a good idea to allow the hostage-taking, rapist-protecting, genocide-committing Chinese regime to host this competition. (Photo by Wang He/Getty Images)

The disappearance of tennis star Peng Shuai this month has led many around the world to question the holding of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. The Games are scheduled to begin February 4.

Now, only the morally bankrupt could think it is a good idea to allow the hostage-taking, rapist-protecting, genocide-committing Chinese regime to host this competition.

It is now time for the world to face the reality of the Communist Party of China and the horrific system it has constructed. There is only one correct choice: Move the Games.

For decades, people overlooked the great crimes of Chinese communism because they had hope that it would, over time, evolve and become benign. When "reformer" Deng Xiaoping shoved aside Hua Guofeng, Mao Zedong's chosen successor, and engineered at the end of 1978 the historic Third Plenum, outsiders thought they were seeing a new—and far superior—"New China."

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** Wounds With a Russian Knife in Them ([link removed])
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by Amir Taheri • November 21, 2021 at 5:30 am
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* The "interim solution" imposed by Russia denies Azerbaijan control of the enclave while preventing its ethnic Armenian population to develop working state structures. In other words, the wound remains open with a Russian knife in it that could be turned anytime Moscow wished.
* Is the "situation" as developed in Transcaucasia a model of Russian behavior in the international arena?
* Several examples could be cited in support of a "yes" answer.
* By keeping all those nations in a state of crisis with their neighbors, Putin achieves one of his two geostrategic goals: preventing NATO expansion to Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia. Because no country in conflict with its neighbors would be allowed to join the US-led coalition, it is important for Russia to keep all those wounds open with its knife in them.
* With the US behaving strangely for the past five years or so and the EU crippled by Brexit, the Western democracies have not been able to develop a coherent analysis of the Russian challenge let alone shape a policy to deal with it. Sending a small number of American or British troops to the Baltic republics and Poland may provide some beguiling TV news footage while huffing and puffing about sanctions could be seen as a sign of confusion rather than a strategy to stand against a de-stabilizing power.
* One school of thoughts in Western policy-making circles is to let Putin choke on the morsels such as Syria, Libya, Iran, Donetsk, Transcaucasia and Belarus that he has bitten but cannot chew let alone digest. That may sound clever in pseudo-Machiavellian terms but could be disastrous in terms of big power politics.

By keeping nations in a state of crisis with their neighbors, Russian President Vladimir Putin achieves one of his two geostrategic goals: preventing NATO expansion to Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia. Because no country in conflict with its neighbors would be allowed to join the US-led coalition, it is important for Russia to keep all those wounds open with its knife in them. Pictured: Putin at the Russian Civil War memorial on Unity Day, in Sevastopol, Crimea, on November 4, 2021. (Photo by Mikhail Metzel/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images)

It was supposed to be a five-year "breathing space" in which two belligerent neighbors would resolve their disputes and shape a durable peace with help from their big altruistic neighbor.

And yet, just months after the "good news" was spread by all concerned, Armenia and Azerbaijan have reignited their border war in Transcaucasia with Russian troops keeping a low profile.

Vladimir Putin had hailed the ceasefire that his emissaries had negotiated as "a great achievement" and a sign that Russia, if given a chance, would act as peacemaker and not the troublemaker that the European Union claims.

The duel in Transcaucasia may appear too insignificant and too remote to merit special attention by the broader outside world. The dispute over the tiny enclave of High Qarabagh would look too exotic to merit special attention.

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