2008 Summer Olympics (Beijing)
People around the world eagerly waited to hear the news announcement-of which city would host the 2008 summer Olympics. The decision comes down to 122 voters who serve on the International Olympic Committee(IOC), and choosing a city is a process that takes years. On July 13, 2001 the announcement was made-that Beijing was awarded the great honor of hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics. The main rival cities were Paris and Toronto, but Beijing beat out second place Toronto by 34
votes. When the IOC is considering which cities would be suitable for hosting the Olympics, there are many issues that must be taken into account. Such as: does the city have decent sports venues, an infrastructure that can support all the fans & publicity, financially is the city in a place that can allow such a giant event to take place, are there proper accomadations for athletes and fans, and alsois the city equipped with strong national security?
The announcement that Beijing will host the 2008 summer Olympicshas received many positive reactions, yet the news certainly has notpassed by without lots of controversy and criticism as well. The maincriticism of having Beijing host the games has to do with human rights abuses. Groups such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty Internationalare infuriated with the choice of host city, saying that giving Beijing such an honor is "putting a stamp of approval on Beijing'shuman rights issues". According to these groups, human rights in China are far below international standards. While clearly some groupsthink that having the Olympics in Beijing is a terrible idea, otheropinions are that the human rights issues will actually improve due to having the Olympics hosted there. The media attention and publicity
surrounding the Olympics, and scrutinizing the human rights problems, may actually cause the country to work on improving human rights standards.
The XXIX Olympiad Games will take place from August 8-24, 2008.
There are 28 sports and a total of 302 events in the 2008 Olympics.
The sports in the summer games are: aquatics, archery, athletics,
badminton, baseball, basketball, boxing, canoe/kayak, cycling,
equestrian, fencing, football, gymnastics, handball, hockey, judo,
modern pentathlon, rowing, sailing, shooting, softball, table tennis,
taekwondo ,tennis triathlon, volleyball, weightlifting, and wrestling.
es in the world.
