When Beijing was awarded the 2008 Summer Olympics, the International Olympic Committee predicted the Games could improve human rights, and Chinese politicians hinted at the same.

Such talk is all but absent this time as the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics open in just over a week.

The Games are a reminder of both China’s rise and its disregard for civil liberties, which has prompted a diplomatic boycott led by the U.S.

Rights groups have documented forced labor, mass detentions and torture, and the U.S. has called China’s internment of at least 1 million Uyghurs genocide. China has also come under criticism over the near-disappearance from public view of tennis star Peng Shuai after she accused a former senior member of the ruling Communist Party of sexually assaulting her.

But with more political, economic and military clout than it had 13 1/2 years ago, China appears to be worrying less about global scrutiny this time. And the COVID-19 pandemic has given it even more control over the Olympics, particularly with the isolation of visiting journalists, separated in a “bubble” from the Chinese population.

“There’s nothing to ‘prove’ at this point; 2008 was a ‘coming out’ party and all this one does is confirm what we’ve known for the last decade,” Amanda Shuman, a China researcher at the University of Freiburg, wrote in an email to The Associated Press.

“If anything, there’s a lot less pressure than 2008,” she said. “The Chinese government knows full well that its global economic upper hand allows it to do whatever it wishes.”

The IOC had few options when it awarded China the Games for the second time. Six possible European candidates, led by Norway and Sweden, bowed out for political or cost reasons. Voters in two other countries — Switzerland and Germany — voted no in referendums.

IOC members eventually picked Beijing — an authoritarian state that doesn’t need voter approval to proceed — over Almaty, Kazakhstan, in a close vote, 44-40.

The IOC has allowed China to avoid human rights oversight. Beginning with the 2024 Paris Olympics, host cities must adhere to the U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. But China was not subject to those rules when it was picked in 2015.

“When China hosts the Olympics again, it is no longer the China back in 2008,” dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei said in an email to The AP. Ai helped design the famous Bird’s Nest stadium that was used in the 2008 Games — hoping it would signify a new openness — and then regretted doing so, calling it and the Olympics China’s “fake smile.”

Ai was jailed in 2011 in China on unspecified charges and now lives in exile in Portugal. The Bird’s Nest will again host the opening ceremony on Feb. 4.

“China today has deviated further away from democracy, freedom of press and human rights, and the reality has become even harsher,” Ai added.

China’s tone has toughened since the last time it hosted the Games.

In 2008, Beijing put some curbs on broadcasting from Tiananmen Square but allowed it; agreed to “protest zones,” though they were never used, with access repeatedly denied; and dropped some reporting restrictions more than a year ahead of the Games. It also unblocked its censored internet for journalists.

In 2022, there is less accommodation. The pandemic will limit journalists to a tightly sealed “bubble,” though there will be internet access. Chinese organizers have warned foreign athletes that any statement that goes against Chinese law could be punished. And a smartphone app widely used by athletes and reporters has glaring security vulnerabilities, according to an internet watchdog.

Some national Olympic committees have advised teams and staff not to take personal phones or laptops to Beijing.

The IOC, which generates billions from sponsorships and broadcast rights, seldom pushes back in public against Chinese organizers who are, in reality, the Chinese government.

Some of the changes that affect 2022 began a month after the 2008 Olympics ended, when the global financial crisis hit. China fared better than most countries, which increased its confidence.

China has since seen the rise of Xi Jinping, who headed the 2008 Olympics and was named general secretary of the Communist Party in 2012.

“Although Xi was in charge of 2008 Olympic Games, the Winter Games is truly Xi’s Games,” said Xu Guoqi, who teaches history at the University of Hong Kong. He is the author of “Olympic Dreams: China and Sports, 1895-2008.”

Mary Gallagher, director of the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan, said the state of U.S. democracy and its “poor pandemic response” have further emboldened China.

“Right now the multiple U.S. failures create momentum for renewed nationalism and confidence in China,” Gallagher said by email. “This is made all the more effective by the Communist Party’s strict control over information, which can rain ‘positive energy’ down on what’s happening in China while only publicizing negative accounts of other countries, especially the U.S.”

China complained in 2008 that human rights protests around Tibet politicized the Olympics. The Olympic Torch Relay, taken on a world tour, faced violent protests in London and elsewhere. The IOC has not tried such a relay since.

China, which has called the allegations of human rights abuses the “lie of the century,” says mixing sports and politics goes against the Olympic Charter. IOC President Thomas Bach has likewise used that principle as a shield against critics.

But others see hypocrisy on China’s part.

“Sports and politics do mix,” Laura Luehrmann, a China specialist at Wright State University, said in an email. “Politics is about the distribution and use of limited resources — most notably power and decision-making, but also finances as well. Sports is all about power and money — even if framed as glorifying athletic achievement.”

Victor Cha, who served in the White House under President George W. Bush and is the author of “Beyond the Final Score — The Politics of Sport in Asia,” said China’s moaning about others politicizing sports is “the pot calling the kettle black.”

“There is no country that has ignored the Olympic Charter’s mandate to keep politics out of sports more than China,” Cha, who teaches at Georgetown University, wrote in an essay last week for the Center for Strategic & International Studies.

“Much as the world would like the Olympics to be devoid of politics, as George Orwell once wrote: ‘Sport is war minus the shooting.’”

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Japanese Emperor Naruhito got it all started again, this time under the theme “We Have Wings.” Among the few on hand were Douglas Emhoff, husband of U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, International Paralympic Committee President Andrew Parsons and International Olympic President Thomas Bach.

It was a circus-like opening with acrobats, clowns, vibrant music and fireworks atop the stadium to mark the the start of the long parade of athletes.

“I cannot believe we are finally here,” Parsons said in his opening remarks. “Many doubted this day would happen. Many thought it impossible. But thanks to the efforts of many, the most transformative sport event on earth is about to begin.”

The opening ceremony featured the national flags of the 162 delegations represented, which included the refugee team. In addition, the flag of Afghanistan was carried by a volunteer despite the delegation not being on hand in Tokyo.

Comparisons to the Olympics stop with the colorful jamboree, save for the logistical and medical barriers during the pandemic, and the hollowing out of almost everything else. Tokyo and Paralympic organizers are under pressure from soaring new infections in the capital. About 40% of the Japanese population is fully vaccinated. But daily new cases in Tokyo have increased four to five times since the Olympics opened on July 23.

Tokyo is under a state of emergency until Sept. 12, with the Paralympics ending Sept. 5. Organizers on Tuesday also announced the first positive test for an athlete living in the Paralympic Village. They gave no name or details and said the athlete had been isolated. The Paralympics are being held without fans, although organizers are planning to let some school children attend, going against the advice of much of the medical community.

Parsons and Seiko Hashimoto, the president of the Tokyo organizing committee, say the Paralympics can be held safely. Both have tried to distance the Paralympics and Olympics from Tokyo’s rising infection rate.

“For the moment we don’t see the correlation between having the Paralympics in Tokyo with the rising number of cases in Tokyo and Japan,” Parsons told The Associated Press.

Some medical experts say even if there is no direct link, the presence of the Olympics and Paralympics promoted a false sense of security and prompted people to let down their guard, which may have helped spread the virus.

The Paralympics are about athletic prowess. The origin of the word is from “parallel” — an event running alongside the Olympics.

Markus Rehm — known as the “Blade Jumper” — lost his right leg below the knee when he was 14 in a wakeboarding accident, but earlier this year he jumped 8.62 meters, a distance that would have won the last seven Olympics, including the Tokyo Games. Tokyo’s winning long jump was 8.41 meters.

“The stigma attached to disability changes when you watch the sport,” said Craig Spence, a spokesman for the International Paralympic Committee. “These games will change your attitude toward disability.

“If you look around Japan, it’s very rare you see persons with disabilities on the street,” Spence added. “We’ve got to go from protecting people to empowering people and creating opportunities for people to flourish in society.” Archer Matt Stutzman was born with no arms, just stumps at the shoulders. He holds a world record — for any archer, disabled or otherwise — for the longest, most accurate shot, hitting a target at 310 yards, or about 283 meters.

Wheelchair fencer Bebe Vivo contracted meningitis as a child and to save her life, doctors amputated both her forearms and both her legs at the knees.

“So many people told me that it was impossible to do fencing without any hands,” Vivo said in a recent interview. “So it was so important to me to demonstrate and show people that it doesn’t matter if you don’t have hands, or you don’t have legs or whatever. If you have a dream and you really want to achieve it, just go and take it.” Stutzman and Vivo are both set to compete in Tokyo and have already won medals in previous games, superstars who told their stories last year in the Netflix documentary about the Paralympics called “Rising Phoenix.”

The rest of the 4,403 Paralympic athletes in Tokyo — a record number for any Paralympics — will be telling their stories until the closing ceremony.

“I feel like I’m meeting movie stars,” said 14-year-old Ugandan swimmer Husnah Kukundakwe, who is competing for the first time.

She acknowledged being a self-conscious adolescent, even more so because of a congenital impairment that left her with no lower right arm, an her left hand slightly misshapen.

“Since it’s the Paralympics and everybody else is disabled, I feel really comfortable with myself,” she said. “In Uganda, there are very few people who have disabilities who want to come out and be themselves.”

Paralympic organizers played a part last week in launching “WeThe15,” a human-rights campaign aimed at 1.2 billion people — 15% of the global population — with disabilities. They’ve also produced a 90-second video to promote the cause of social inclusion.

“Difference is a strength, it is not a weakness,” Parsons said, speaking in the largely empty stadium. “And as we build back better in the post-pandemic world, it must feature societies where opportunities exist for all.” Shingo Katori, a member of boy band SMAP that had its roots in the 1980s, now works with Paralympic organizers. He acknowledged his early fears of working with people with disabilities.

“Frankly speaking, people in wheelchairs or people with artificial legs — I hadn’t had an opportunity to meet these people and I didn’t know how to communicate with them,” he said. “But through Paralympic sports, such hesitation faded away.”

Stutzman, known as the “Armless Archer,” has a disarming sense of humor — pardon the pun. He jokes about growing up wanting the be like former NBA star Michael Jordan.

“I gave it up,” he deadpans. “I wasn’t tall enough.”

STEPHEN WADE | Contributed

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TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s capital, Tokyo, reported its highest number of new coronavirus infections on Tuesday, days after the Olympics began. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga urged people to avoid non-essential outings, but said there was no need to consider a suspension of the Games.

Tokyo reported 2,848 new COVID-19 cases, exceeding its earlier record of 2,520 daily cases on Jan. 7. That brings its total to more than 200,000 since the pandemic began last year.

Tokyo is under its fourth coronavirus state of emergency, which is to continue through the Olympics until just before the Paralympics start in late August.

Experts have warned that the more contagious delta variant could cause a surge during the Olympics, which started Friday.

Still, Japan has kept its cases and deaths lower than many other countries. Nationwide, it reported 5,020 daily cases Monday for a total of 870,445 and 15,129 deaths. Its 7-day rolling average of cases is about 3.57 per 100,000 people, compared to 2.76 in India, 17.3 in the United States and 53.1 in Britain, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

Asked if he is considering an option of suspending the Games, Suga replied, “There is no worry about that,” adding that people have been moving about less since the Games started because of traffic controls and the government’s request that they work remotely.

Suga again urged that people avoid non-essential outings. “Please watch the Olympic Games on TV at home,(asterisk) he said.

Suga’s government has been criticized for what some say is prioritizing the Olympics over the nation’s health. His public support ratings have fallen to around 30% in recent media surveys, and there is little festivity surrounding the Games.

Health Minister Norihisa Tamura, asked about the jump in cases, said it was not a surprise. “Taking into consideration the global acceleration of infections because of the delta strain, which is taking over earlier variants, it was quite possible,” he said.

Tamura blamed bars and restaurants that are still serving alcohol despite a ban under the state of emergency as a possible cause, instead of the Olympics.

The continuing upsurge despite two weeks of emergency measures, which focus on shortened hours for eateries and an alcohol ban, mean they are ineffective, said Kazuhiro Tateda, a Toho University infectious diseases expert who is on a government panel. With the Olympics and summer holidays prompting the movement of people, infections could escalate in coming weeks, Tateda told NHK public television.

Experts noted that cases among younger, unvaccinated people are rising sharply as Japan’s inoculation drive loses steam due to supply uncertainty. Many serious cases involve those in their 50s. They now dominate Tokyo’s nearly 3,000 hospitalized patients and are gradually filling up available beds. Authorities reportedly plan to ask medical institutions to increase their capacity to about 6,000 beds for COVID-19 patients.

Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike said elderly people are now more than 60% fully vaccinated and account for just 2% of new cases. “It is crucial to promptly vaccinate younger people,” she said.

Japan’s vaccination drive began late and slowly, but picked up dramatically in May for several weeks as the supply of imported vaccines stabilized and the government pushed to inoculate more people before the Olympics.

The government says 25.5% of Japanese have been fully vaccinated, still way short of the level believed to have any meaningful impact on reducing the risk for the general population.

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