Richard Gere: boycott the Olympic Games in Beijing

In Venice to present his new movie, «The Hunting Party», Richard Gere called for a boycott of the Olympic Games in Beijing in August 2008.

As the chairman of the International Campaign for Tibet, the American actor told Reuters the Olympic Games were a «good opportunity to encourage China to end human rights abuses in Tibet and allow the Himalayan region to decide its future.»

China invaded Tibet in 1950, which displaced around 120,000 Tibetans, including their spiritual head, the Dalai Lama. According to Amnesty International, the Chinese invaders have severely limited the freedom of those remaining and are destroying their culture, while Beijing says they are helping to develop a historically poor country.

Taking advantage of his role as a presenter at the Venice Film Festival, Richard Gere stated: «A general boycott to me certainly has value; it's probably impractical, but emotionally absolutely makes sense. Why should the world reward people who are obviously so bad to their own people, so bad to other people.»