China is right to laugh at the west

Signs of the enervating weakness of the west’s governing elites aren’t that hard to find but the case of the Winter Olympics may be the most demeaning. The UK and Canada have followed the US and Australia in announcing a diplomatic boycott of February’s games in Beijing over China’s human rights record. It’s a crushing blow to the communist dictatorship: Xi Jinping has been unable to sleep or dress himself since learning that the deputy head of the British mission will be skipping the mixed doubles luge final.

The UK’s boycott may not even be a boycott, with Boris Johnson saying ‘we do not support sporting boycotts but there are certainly no plans for ministers to attend the Winter Olympics’, then confirming there would be ‘effectively a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympics in Beijing’, and thereafter stating: ‘I do not think that sporting boycotts are sensible and that remains the policy of the government’.