THE press MONDAY; FEBRUARY 18,1980. Rescuing the Olympic spirit

Press, 18 February 1980, Page 16

THE press MONDAY; FEBRUARY 18,1980. Rescuing the Olympic spirit

National Olympic committees and indiV at^letes have three months in which to decide whether Jo attend the ames hl Moscow. More than 20 Governments have announced that they support the United States in seeking a boycott of the Olympics after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan. As many countries again are believed to nave indicated privately to the United States that they are in favour of a boycott. . If as many as 50 countries, including some of the biggest teams, were to, pull out of. the Games, any pretence, that Olympic competition was about to take place in Moscow would make': nonsense. Indeed, the boycott movement would probably become a landslide as other countries joined in. ...Whether the boycott movement takes off really depends on whether competitors from the Western world’s most successful sporting nations are going to be present in Moscow. That is, will competitors from the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, and Japan be present? Governments of all those countries have indicated, just as the New Zealand Government has indicated, that they do not want their national teams to go to Moscow. All those countries are also among the minority of' members of the Olympic movement whose national Olympic associations, and whose individual athletes, are free from political control. The decision to attend or to boycott the Games may be made by the Olympic associations of the member countries and by individual athletes who might be eligible for selection. If they go to the Games, they will go to the Games without the blessings of the Governments, which may not trouble many: in some instances they would go without financial help from those Governments. They will not be physically prevented'from taking part. Apart from the latest protests over the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, the Soviet Union can be condemned in terms of the principles of the Olympic movement for the professionalism of its athletes, for the State control of its Olympic organisation: for the crude political oppression of sections of its

own peoples, which must deny free selection of athletes: and for the vast national political advantage which it clearly hopes to make from the Games. All this is in precise contravention of the Olympic regulations. Moscow stands condemned in the court of world opinion for Soviet aggression in Afghanistan, an. aggression which has recalled earlier expansions of the Soviet empire in the Baltic States and 1 Eastern Europe.

When the International Olympic Committee ordained Moscow as the host for the 1980 Olympics the com-' mittee might have been excused for overlooking the foreseeable breaches of its rules; hopes of more cordial and relaxed international relations, and the use of the Games as an instrument to obtain these, are not to be scoffed at if the grounds for hope are present. This thought is in line with the principles behind holding the Games at all. When those grounds disappear, and when the host country is conspicuously manipulating the occasion for its own political ends rather than for the wider purposes of the 1.0. C. the hope suddenly fades.

Yet the International Olympic Committee, in its curious wisdom, has endorsed its decision this week. Athletes and sports administrators in the West and elsewhere still have time tor bring the international organisation to its senses. It might be too late to transfer the Games to another venue this year. It is not too late for those sportsmen and sportswomen who are still free to choose, to demonstrate that the Olympic spirit should not be used by an expansionist dictatorship for its own national purposes.

To make the point they will, ofi course, have to sacrifice their own ambitions and subdue their own hopes of success in what should have been the great sporting event of 1980. No matter what happens now, the Games cannot fulfil their finest purposes. A firm, concerted gesture by sports people might yet save the Olympics from complete loss of respect as a sports occasion untainted by partisan politics and self-serving manipulation.