Activists from Tibet protested against the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Greece, hanging a banner at the Acropolis and disrupting the torch lighting ceremony at the ancient Olympia site. A total of six people have been arrested.
Two people were arrested in Athens on Sunday as they attempted to hang a banner from the Acropolis. A security officer quickly confiscated a banner they tried to unfurl.
However, the two women were able to put up a Tibetan flag and a smaller banner reading “Free Hong Kong Revolution.” They chanted slogans calling for a boycott of the Beijing games until police arrived and detained them, politico.eu reported..
Greek police said a man and two women were arrested “for violating the law on protection of archaeological sites.” A senior Greek official said they will appear before the prosecutor on Monday morning.
A New York-based campaign group called Students for a Free Tibet said two of those arrested were Tibetan student Tsela Zoksang, 18, and exiled Hong Kong activist Joey Siu, 22.
“We call on the Greek authorities to resist any pressure from the Chinese Government to extradite these activists,” said a statement from another group, the U.K.-based Hong Kong Watch.
On Monday noon, a group interrupted the torch lighting ceremony, as the Students for a Free Tibet posted on social media.
According to the group, four activists were also detained at the entrance of the site by plain clothes and were taken to a police station nearby where they remained also early Monday afternoon.
China has invested heavily in Greece during the country’s long financial crisis, raising concerns about Beijing’s undue influence in the country, politico notes adding that iIn 2017, Greece drew criticism when it vetoed a planned European Union condemnation of China’s human rights record at the U.N. Human Rights Council.
“Now it is time for the international community, and all people of conscience, to take a stand and boycott Beijing 2022; anything less will be a clear endorsement of China’s genocidal regime,” Zoksang was quoted as saying in the Students for a Free Tibet statement.
The group demands that the International Olympic Committee reverse a decision to award the games to Beijing, citing human rights abuses, including China’s treatment of the Uyghur people, the occupation of Tibet and the crackdown in Hong Kong.
