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      Where Is Peng Shuai? Tennis Players and Fans Still Want to Know

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      A central question, “Where is Peng Shuai?”, has represented concern for the star but also points to related questions about the future of tennis in China.MELBOURNE, Australia — Xiao, a Chinese-born and Melbourne-based artist, was disturbed that the plight of the Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai had slipped off the radar ahead of the first Grand Slam tournament of the year. So she designed a T-shirt, and much to the dismay of Australian Open organizers, wore it to Melbourne Park.Xiao was concerned that the unvaccinated tennis star Novak Djokovic’s fight with the Australian government had overshadowed the plight of Peng, one of China’s most popular tennis stars, who has mostly disappeared from public view since she accused a former top Chinese leader of sexual assault. Xiao’s shirt had on the front a picture of Peng’s face and on the back the slogan “Where is Peng Shuai?”, a message that has been used heavily online as a call to confront the Chinese Communist Party about the #MeToo accusation that prompted the women’s tennis tour to suspend its tournaments in China.Security guards later told Xiao, who also brought a sign with the slogan, that the items were not permitted, citing a tournament policy banning fans from making political statements.“It’s a reminder for people to not forget about Peng Shuai, especially since we had a huge Djokovic drama recently,” said Xiao, 26, who spoke on the condition that her full name not be used because of concerns for her safety after calling out the Chinese government.On Tuesday, after criticism from the 18-time major singles champion Martina Navratilova and others, the Australian Open softened its policy and is now allowing T-shirts and other personal messages supporting Peng, who has remained top of mind for many people involved in women’s tennis since her accusation first surfaced in November.Xiao’s shirt in support of Peng Shuai, which was banned by security guards at the tournament, though the ban was later reversed.Ben RothenbergPeng, a U.S. Open singles semifinalist and former world No. 1 in doubles, said then — in a post on her verified account on the social media site Weibo — that she had been sexually assaulted by Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier of China. In the post, Peng wrote that they had once been involved in a consensual relationship.The post was taken down minutes later. Online discussion of the allegation was censored within China, and Peng disappeared from public view for weeks while tennis officials and fellow players tried unsuccessfully to reach her. Peng, a three-time Olympian, later had conversations via video with International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and other Olympic officials.In a statement after the first of those meetings in November, the I.O.C. announced that Peng had said she was “safe and well,” and she has since been seen publicly in China in several social media posts. On Dec. 1, Steve Simon, chief executive of the Women’s Tennis Association, suspended tournaments in the country and renewed his call for a “full and transparent” investigation from the Chinese authorities.Peng later told a reporter for a Singaporean newspaper in Beijing that her initial post had been misunderstood and that she had “never said or written that anyone has sexually assaulted me.”What to Know About Peng ShuaiThe Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai disappeared from public view for weeks after she accused a top Chinese leader of sexual assault.What Happened: The athlete’s vanishing and subsequent reappearance in several videos prompted global concern over her well-being.A Silencing Operation: China turned to a tested playbook to stamp out discussion and shift the narrative. The effort didn’t always succeed.Eluding the Censors: Supporters of the tennis star found creative ways to voice their frustration online.A Sudden Reversal: Ms. Peng retracted her accusation in an interview in December. But her words seemed unlikely to quell fears for her safety.But the WTA, whose leaders still have been unable to make direct contact with Peng, has not softened its stance or its demands, fearing that she has been coerced into the retraction.“We appreciate seeing the support continue for Peng Shuai,” Simon said Wednesday in an email. “The WTA is proud of Peng Shuai in speaking out for what is right, and we continue with our unwavering call for confirmation of Peng’s safety along with a full, fair and transparent investigation, without censorship, into her allegation of sexual assault. This is an issue that can never fade away.”Magda Linette, a leading Polish player and member of the WTA player council, said she hoped Peng could speak with players directly or with Simon. “If we could see her in an environment where we know she is not being really controlled and we can have at least a conversation, because she has been refusing that, I think that would be a really good step to trying to rebuild the trust, trying to rebuild the relationship again to see how things are going and how she is actually,” Linette said.In a photo made available by the International Olympic Committee, I.O.C. President Thomas Bach speaking with Peng Shuai during a videoconference.Greg Martin/OIS/IOC/EPA-EFE, via ShutterstockAlizé Cornet of France, a quarterfinalist at the Australian Open and one of the players to raise concerns about Peng’s safety in November, said some of her fears had been allayed.“It’s not the huge concern I had in November where I imagined she might have been buried in a ditch,” Cornet said last week.Cornet added that she believed that Peng was not in physical danger, but that “I’m concerned to know how things will go for her and what will become of her.”The renewed attention on Peng comes at a politically sensitive time with the Winter Olympics scheduled to begin in Beijing on Feb. 4. “It is kind of sad to see her story, especially when we are technically in an Asia-Pacific Slam, kind of not be a topic anymore,” said Jessica Pegula, an American player who reached the quarterfinals in Melbourne. “It’s disappointing, but it is kind of how the media is. Stuff blows up. Then it goes away, and it blows up again, and something else comes.”Pegula, who said she was not reassured by Peng’s recent video appearances, added: “Maybe it will catch up more when the Olympics come around.”The Australian Open, one of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments, has long positioned itself as the “Grand Slam of Asia-Pacific” in part because of concerns that China or another nation in the region might attempt to usurp its status. A state-owned Chinese liquor company, Luzhou Laojiao, has been a major tournament sponsor since 2019 and holds the naming rights for one of the principal show courts. Tennis Australia, which runs the event, has an office and presence in China and has backed tournaments in China that awarded wild-card entries into the Australian Open.Branding for Luzhou Laojiao’s Guojiao 1573 beverage is displayed prominently at the Australian Open.Alana Holmberg for The New York TimesThe Australian Open also has an agreement with CCTV, the national Chinese broadcaster, which has been broadcasting men’s and women’s matches from this Australian Open.But Chinese television did not broadcast the women’s tournaments in 2022 that were played ahead of the Open despite owning the rights. It is unclear whether this constitutes a boycott. In 2019, CCTV stopped airing N.B.A. games after Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Houston Rockets at the time, expressed support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.No events for the WTA or ATP, the professional men’s tennis tour, have been held in China since early 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic, which had shut down international sports events in the country before the upcoming Olympics. The WTA had made China one of the pillars of its tour and agreed to a lucrative 10-year deal to stage its year-end championships, the WTA Finals, in Shenzhen. But the event, first held there in 2019, was moved to Guadalajara, Mexico, last year because of the pandemic with just eight weeks to prepare.The WTA would need to lift the suspension on Chinese tournaments if they were to take place this year. The China swing is scheduled for September, October and November. The WTA has not given a deadline but wants to finalize its fall schedule much earlier than it did in 2021. With China unlikely to launch a formal investigation into Peng’s allegations of sexual assault, cancellation of this year’s China swing appears likely, although Simon has said that this would not necessarily end the tour’s commitment to Chinese tournaments in 2023 and beyond.The ATP has made statements of support for Peng but has not suspended any events as a result of her situation. Pegula said she was disappointed the ATP had not done more. “I just think it was the right thing to do,” she said. “I wish they would have, and I guess they still could. We’ll see.”Reilly Opelka, one of the leading American male players, called the ATP’s hands-off approach “lame” and “weak.”“We rely so much less on China than the WTA does and look at that statement,” he said. “And that digs into a deeper problem: Why didn’t enough ATP players speak out? Is it conflicts of interest? It’s hard to say.”Interest in tennis in China boomed after Li Na became the country’s first Grand Slam singles champion, winning the 2011 French Open and 2014 Australian Open. Though no Chinese player has matched those results, promising talents are on the rise, including Wang Xinyu, a tall and powerful 20-year-old who pushed the No. 2-seeded Aryna Sabalenka to three sets in the second round of the Australian Open last week.Chinese players in Melbourne have refused one-on-one interviews with The New York Times, but Xu Yifan, a women’s doubles specialist, said during a news conference that it was important for tennis’ future in China to have tour events in the country. “Especially for Chinese players, we all enjoy,” said Xu, who declined to comment on Peng Shuai’s situation.“We didn’t really focus on it,” she said. “We just tried to focus on our tennis most of the time.”The WTA may be able to cover much of its lost Chinese revenue by adding events elsewhere. But there is still concern about the future.“We had a bunch of amazing tournaments in China, and I think in response, they’ve had so many players coming up and really have now so many juniors that are really good and tennis has been the strongest ever really in China,” Linette said. “So, I think for both of us, for the sake of the WTA and for China if it wants that their players keep developing and still have a chance to go out and do something more in tennis, it’s better for both that this situation be resolved in a peaceful manner.”For now, it remains a delicate dance. The artist Xiao said she hesitated before bringing her message of support for Peng to the Australian Open. “But I just feel like I had to do what I had to do,” she said.Spectators showed their support for Peng Shuai as Nick Kyrgios played doubles with Thanasi Kokkinakis.Dave Hunt/EPA, via ShutterstockXiao described the atmosphere on her first day at the tournament, Wednesday, as “quite chill.” “Two guards came and they just asked me, ‘Oh, what is Peng Shuai?’” Xiao recalled. “We explained to them the situation and they just said, ‘Oh, that’s an unfortunate story,’ and they just left. They were really nice about it, actually.”After posting pictures of her protest at the tournament on social media, Xiao was contacted by local activists who wanted to join her. On Friday, they went to a third-round women’s singles match featuring the Chinese player Wang Qiang, hoping they would be seen on broadcasts of the match back in China.While the group was moving between Wang’s match and a Naomi Osaka practice session, the situation turned more confrontational, leaving Xiao “on the verge of a panic attack” as an encounter between the activists and security guards was filmed for use on the activists’ social media accounts.Xiao said she was offered a chance to stay at the tournament if she stashed the offending items in a booth outside the entrance but chose to leave Melbourne Park instead. Hours later, on Friday evening, Xiao returned and wrote “Where is Peng Shuai?” in chalk on an exterior wall of the tournament grounds.Xiao said she “knew the rules from the beginning” against political banners at the tournament and was not surprised that Tennis Australia initially enforced them.“I kind of expect it,” Xiao said, “because they have Chinese sponsors, right?”Xiao’s graffiti on the exterior wall of the tournament grounds.Ben RothenbergCraig Tiley, chief executive of Tennis Australia, said in an interview on Monday that the tournament’s view was not influenced by its Chinese commercial interests. He said Tennis Australia backed the WTA’s stance on Peng Shuai and had attempted to use its connections in China to establish contact with her.“It doesn’t have to just be on a political or commercial issue,” Tiley said. “If we make the assessment that they come in to disrupt the comfort and safety of our fans, it’s not going to be welcome. But if they want to come in with a T-shirt and it says, ‘Where is Peng Shuai?’ they can do that. We don’t have a problem with that.”The shift by tournament officials does not change the question posed by Xiao and others. The activists who joined the artist have raised money to pay for a thousand more T-shirts that they plan to hand out to spectators before the women’s singles final. More

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      How China Censored Peng Shuai

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      This article is published with ProPublica, the nonprofit investigative newsroom. When inconvenient news erupts on the Chinese internet, the censors jump into action. Twenty minutes was all it took to mobilize after Peng Shuai, the tennis star and one of China’s most famous athletes, went online and accused Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier, of […] More

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      I.O.C. Says It Held Second Video Call With Peng Shuai

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      Olympic officials said they ‘shared the same concern as many’ about the safety of the Chinese tennis star but offered no details of what they discussed with her.The International Olympic Committee said Thursday that it had held a second call with the Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai, trying anew to deflect criticism of its light-touch approach to China only months before the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing.“We share the same concern as many other people and organizations about the well-being and safety of Peng Shuai,” the I.O.C. statement said. “This is why, just yesterday, an IOC team held another video call with her. We have offered her wide-ranging support, will stay in regular touch with her, and have already agreed on a personal meeting in January.”IOC Statement on the situation of Peng Shuaihttps://t.co/7wDhc0w33f— IOC MEDIA (@iocmedia) December 2, 2021
      As with an earlier call with Peng on Nov. 21, the I.O.C. did not release video or a transcript of the call, nor did it say how Wednesday’s call was arranged or who took part. The previous call included the I.O.C.’s president, Thomas Bach but also an I.O.C. member from China.Peng, 35, disappeared from public view more than a month ago after she accused Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier of China, of sexual assault. Her disappearance, China’s efforts to censor any mention of her allegations and its sometimes clumsy efforts to suggest she had retracted her claims, have only intensified concerns about her safety with tennis officials, fellow athletes and human rights groups.The I.O.C. statement, like its earlier statements on Peng, made no mention of her sexual assault claims, referring only to “the difficult situation she is in.”The latest call, which the I.O.C. said took place on Wednesday, came on the same day the women’s professional tennis tour announced it would suspend all of its events in China, including Hong Kong, until the Chinese government took several measures. It called for the government to stop censoring Peng, allow her to speak and travel freely and “investigate the allegation of sexual assault in a full, fair and transparent manner.”Olympic officials have been on the defensive for weeks for their relative silence on Peng’s disappearance, which critics of both the organization and of China have derided as an attempt to avoid even the appearance of criticizing a powerful partner. The looming Winter Olympics in China, which will make Beijing the first city to host the Summer and Winter Games, open on Feb. 4.The I.O.C. has countered that its effort to aid Peng has been a campaign of “quiet diplomacy,” a phrase it repeated in Thursday’s statement.“There are different ways to achieve her well-being and safety,” the I.O.C. said. “We have taken a very human and person-centered approach to her situation. Since she is a three-time Olympian, the I.O.C. is addressing these concerns directly with Chinese sports organizations. We are using ‘quiet diplomacy’ which, given the circumstances and based on the experience of governments and other organizations, is indicated to be the most promising way to proceed effectively in such humanitarian matters.” More

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      Thomas Bach Is Criticized for His Handling of the Peng Shuai Case

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      The handling of the Peng Shuai case raised new questions about the I.O.C.’s relationship with China. One Olympic official called its actions ‘discreet.’ Critics called it collaboration.The International Olympic Committee was under siege.Peng Shuai, a three-time Olympian from China, had not been heard from for weeks after making sexual abuse allegations against a senior political official, a man who had played a central role in preparations for the coming Winter Games in Beijing.Initially silent on the disappearance of Peng, a women’s tennis star, Olympic officials were now facing a growing global chorus of concern. The WTA Tour, through its chief executive, was demanding answers and an investigation. Fellow tennis stars like Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka — but also human rights groups, politicians and everyday fans — were using social media to ask #WhereIsPengShuai? Media organizations were flooding the internet with news coverage.Cornered by the criticism, the I.O.C. finally responded. This, Olympic officials insisted, was a time not for public statements but for “quiet diplomacy.”For the organization’s many critics, the guarded, cautious language — viewed more as an attempt to explain away its silence rather than ensure Peng’s safety — was just the latest proof that the I.O.C. will not take any action that might upset China’s government, its partner for a Winter Olympics that is now only months away.The response drew public condemnation and frustration behind the scenes in the Olympic movement.“The I.O.C. must not be complicit in protecting the regime and allowing it be captured for Chinese propaganda purposes,” said Maximilian Klein, the head of international relations for Athleten Deutschland, a representative group for German athletes.The efforts of Olympic officials to clarify the status of the Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai did little to assuage concerns about her safety.Andy Brownbill/Associated PressMany national Olympic committees, facing pressure at home to speak out more forcefully on China’s human rights record, are now grumbling about what they feel is a failure of leadership by the I.O.C. Some fear that the unwillingness of Olympic leaders to challenge or pressure China has left them, and their athletes, exposed to possible retribution during the Games.“In absence of them saying something, it shifts pressure to others to do so,” said one national Olympic committee official, who declined to be quoted by name out of fear of making an uncomfortable situation worse. “If we start being critical, all of a sudden it becomes more political if a nation starts to criticize China.”“We are the ones that need to keep our heads down,” the official added, “not the I.O.C.”The efforts of top Olympic officials to clarify Peng’s status have done little to ease the crisis of confidence. On Sunday, the I.O.C. released an image of a video call involving Peng and Thomas Bach, the I.O.C. president. The call was the first known contact between the tennis player and a Western sports official since she went public with her sexual assault allegations, and since China, which once hailed her successes in state media, quickly deleted them and then moved to erase any mention of her accusation.Rather than assuage concerns, though, the call only raised more questions about the relationship the I.O.C. enjoys with China’s government.The I.O.C. statement accompanying the image provided scant details of what was discussed during the 30-minute meeting with Peng, 35, and it conspicuously avoided reference to the sexual assault allegations against Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier of China who retired in 2018. Zhang was vice premier when Beijing was awarded the Winter Olympics in 2015, and he led an organizational committee that oversaw preparations. In 2016, he met Bach during a visit to China.In the single image released by the I.O.C., Peng is smiling broadly in a room filled with plush toys, including mascots from previous Olympics. The I.O.C. statement said Bach ended the call by suggesting he and Peng try to meet for dinner when he arrives in Beijing in January. The committee did not release any audio or transcript of what Peng said in her own words or suggest Bach or anyone else asked her about her sexual assault claims.“To just kind of whitewash the whole thing — ‘Nothing to see here!’— is generally problematic,” said Sarah Cook, the director of research for China at Freedom House, a rights organization based in Washington, D.C., referring to the I.O.C.’s handling of the case and its relationship generally with the Olympic hosts. “Collaborating with the Chinese government to suppress people’s rights is different than anything that has been done before.”Thomas Bach, the I.O.C. president, above, arranged a call with Peng when efforts by the WTA Tour and others had been unsuccessful.Petros Giannakouris/Associated PressRichard Pound, a Canadian lawyer and the I.O.C.’s longest-serving member, defended the organization’s tactics — and took aim at its critics — in an interview last week.“What the I.O.C. established is that quiet and discreet diplomacy gets you better than clashing cymbals,” Pound said. “That’s not the way you deal with any country, certainly not with China.”It is unclear how Bach managed to engineer a call with Peng when the WTA Tour and others had been unsuccessful, though the presence on the call of an I.O.C. member from China, Li Lingwei, offered a tantalizing clue.“The I.O.C. has vaulted itself from silence about Beijing’s abysmal human rights record to active collaboration with Chinese authorities in undermining freedom of speech and disregarding alleged sexual assault,” said Yaqiu Wang, a senior China researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The I.O.C. appears to prize its relationship with a major human rights violator over the rights and safety of Olympic athletes.”Teng Biao, a lawyer and prominent human rights campaigner who was detained in 2008 for criticizing China’s preparations for that year’s Summer Olympics, said it was illogical that Peng would have organized a call with Bach by herself. In a telephone interview from his home in New Jersey, where he now lives in exile, Teng suggested the authorities in Beijing had set up the call with Bach rather than risk one between Peng and a critic like the WTA Tour chief executive, Steve Simon, who has pressed China publicly to allow Peng to move and speak freely.When it comes to the Olympics in Beijing, Teng said, “The I.O.C. and Bach are not neutral.”For Bach, a pragmatist, there has been little room to maneuver once China secured hosting rights to the 2022 Winter Games six years ago amid a dearth of suitable candidate cities. The Olympics generate 91 percent of the organization’s income, so the I.O.C. has long avoided doing anything that might put at risk those billions of dollars in revenue.“Thomas Bach is all about protecting the Olympics,” Adam Pengilly, a former I.O.C. member, said in explaining how Bach, formerly a gold-medal-winning fencer, has moved to secure the future of the Games since assuming the presidency in 2013.Activists last month in Tokyo called for a boycott of the Beijing Games because of China’s human rights record.Philip Fong/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesDuring his tenure, crucial long-term television agreements have been completed, and rules were changed to appoint Paris and Los Angeles hosts for the next two Olympics without competition. Then a small committee was empowered to streamline the process even further, effectively delivering the 2032 Summer Games to Brisbane, Australia, the home nation of the committee’s leader, before any other city could bid.“He would justify that by saying, ‘I think this is the best way to protect the Olympics,’” Pengilly said of Bach. “When that’s your starting point, then you bring yourself into difficulties when stuff like this happens.”The I.O.C. has wrestled with thorny questions about China’s human rights record for years. In 2008, when Beijing hosted the Summer Games, the I.O.C. adopted a public relations posture that the greater scrutiny the Olympics bring would ultimately yield positive changes within Chinese society.Yet since then, the opposite has happened. While in 2008 the focus was largely on China’s policies in Tibet, its government now also faces criticism of its crackdown on political freedoms in Hong Kong, the semiautonomous territory, and its repression in the Xinjiang region, where hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs and other Muslims have been detained in a campaign that the United States has called genocidal.Tarred as complicit in human rights violations, the I.O.C. that once suggested it could change China by giving it the Games has more recently argued that it can control only what happens inside the Olympic bubble.Beijing continues to prepare for the Winter Games. The Yanqing National Sliding Center hosted a recent stop in luge’s World Cup season.Mark Schiefelbein/Associated Press“The International Olympic Committee, as a civil nongovernmental organization, is strictly politically neutral at all times,” Bach wrote last year in a column published by The Guardian. “Neither awarding the Games, nor participating, are a political judgment regarding the host country.”Christophe Dubi, the most senior I.O.C. official responsible for the Olympics, insisted human rights clauses were included in its contract with Beijing, though Peng’s case appears to fall outside that agreement.“What is outside the contract is a different story, but we act where we have a contract and there we are very clear,” Dubi told The New York Times this week.“I follow what is going on,” Dubi added, “and am I happy that the I.O.C. is being criticized? No, I am not happy that the I.O.C. is being criticized. I am not happy when I hear and read some of the stories.”Dubi insisted that no subject would be off limits to the news media attending and covering the Games, but whether there will be answers remains unclear. Chinese officials pressed about Peng initially claimed ignorance even as the story drew worldwide attention, and, like the I.O.C., the Chinese government still has not commented on the sexual assault allegations.The Olympic committee’s light-touch response to them, though, may have ensured that nothing will derail the final push toward the opening ceremony in Beijing in less than 100 days.“It does not encroach on anything I’m doing at my level to deliver the Games,” Dubi said. More

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      Do Sports Still Need China?

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      Global outrage, broken contracts and shifting politics could change the calculus for leagues and teams that once raced to do business in China.The rewards for international sports leagues and organizations are plain: lucrative broadcast deals, bountiful sponsorship opportunities, millions of new consumers.The risks are obvious, too: the compromising of values, the public relations nightmares, the general atmosphere of opacity.For years, they have surveyed the Chinese market, measured these factors and come up with the same basic math: that the benefits of doing business there outweighed the possible downsides. The N.B.A. might blunder into a humbling political crisis based on a single tweet, and rich contracts might vanish into thin air overnight, but China, the thinking went, was a potential gold mine. And for that reason leagues, teams, governing bodies and athletes contorted themselves for any chance to tap into it.But recent events may have changed that thinking for good, and raised a new question: Is doing business in China still worth it?The sports world received a hint last week of a changing dynamic when the WTA — one of many organizations that have worked aggressively over the last decade to establish a foothold in the Chinese market — threatened to stop doing business there altogether if the government failed to confirm the safety of Peng Shuai. Peng, a top women’s tennis player once hailed by state media as “our Chinese princess,” disappeared from public life recently after accusing a prominent former government official of sexual assault.The WTA’s threat was remarkable not only for its reasoning, but for its rarity.WTA Tour officials, fellow players and human rights groups spoke up for Peng Shuai after China tried to censor her accusations of sexual abuse.Demetrius Freeman for The New York TimesBut as China’s president, Xi Jinping, governs through an increasingly heavy-handed personal worldview, and as China’s aggressive approach to geopolitics and its record on human rights make the country, and those who do business there, a growing target for a chorus of critics and activists, sports leagues and organizations may soon be forced to re-evaluate their longstanding assumptions.That sort of direct confrontation is already taking place elsewhere: Lawmakers in the European Union recently called for stronger ties with Taiwan, an island China claims as its territory, only months after European officials blocked a landmark commercial agreement over human rights concerns and labeled China a “totalitarian threat.”For most sports organizations, the WTA’s position remains an outlier. Sports organizations with multimillion-dollar partnerships in China — whether the N.B.A., England’s Premier League, Formula 1 auto racing or the International Olympic Committee — have mostly brushed aside concerns.Some partners have acquiesced at times to China’s various demands. A few have issued humbling apologies. The I.O.C., in perhaps the most notable example, has seemed to go out of its way to avoid angering China, even as Peng, a former Olympian, went missing.But an evolving public opinion may get harder for sports organizations to ignore. A report this year from the Pew Research Center, for instance, found that 67 percent of Americans had negative feelings toward China, up from 46 percent in 2018. Similar shifts have occurred in other Western democracies.Mark Dreyer, a sports analyst for China Sports Insider, based in Beijing, said the WTA’s standoff with China represented an escalation in the “them or us” mentality that appeared to be forming between China and its Western rivals.The threat from the WTA, then, could serve as a sign of showdowns to come, in which case, Dreyer said, China could lose out.“Frankly, China is a big market, but the rest of the world is still bigger,” he said. “And if people have to choose, they’re not going to choose China.”To some experts, then, the WTA’s extraordinary decision to confront China head-on might actually signal a turning point, rather than an aberration.“The calculation is one part political, one part moral, one part economic,” said Simon Chadwick, a professor of international sports business at Emlyon Business School in Lyon, France. He said that the WTA’s dispute with China reflected the “red line” growing between the country and many of its Western counterparts, with the sides seeming more entrenched in diverging sociopolitical ideologies.Some sports organizations are deepening their ties to China. Formula 1, for example, just extended its contract for the Chinese Grand Prix, keeping the race in Shanghai through 2025.Greg Baker/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“I think we are rapidly heading toward the kind of terrain where organizations, businesses, and sponsors will be forced to choose one side or another,” Chadwick added.The WTA’s own about-face was stark. Only three years ago, the organization was heralding a deal that made Shenzhen, China, the new home of its tour finals for a decade starting in 2019, accepting promises of a new stadium and a whopping $14 million annual prize pool. In 2019, just before the pandemic, the WTA held nine tournaments in China.Fast forward to last week, when Steve Simon, the WTA’s chief executive, said in an interview with The New York Times that if China did not agree to an independent inquiry of Peng’s claims, that the tour would be willing to cease operations in the country.“There are too many decisions being made today that aren’t based on what is simply right and wrong,” Simon said. “And this is the right thing to do, 100 percent.”The language raised eyebrows around the sports world.“They are not the first ones to have had a run-in with China,” Zhe Ji, the director of Red Lantern, a sports marketing company that does work in China, said about the WTA. “But I haven’t seen anybody else come out with as strong a wording as that.”The run-ins have proliferated in only the last few years.The N.B.A., for instance, was seen as a pioneer when it played its first games in China in 2004, including a game featuring Yao Ming, the Chinese star for the Houston Rockets. The ensuing years brought prosperity for the league there, and relative peace. It was praised for its patient, culturally sensitive approach to building there. Then, in 2019, Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Rockets at the time, tweeted in support of pro-democracy protests taking place in Hong Kong, and in the blink of an eye a relationship that had developed over several years imploded.Merchandise for the Rockets — China’s favorite team in China’s favorite sports league — was removed from stores, and the team’s games were no longer broadcast on television. Fans took to Chinese social media to attack the league. Then, when the N.B.A. issued what was widely taken as an apology, it sparked an almost equally robust wave of criticism back home. (The N.B.A. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.)“The NBA should have anticipated the challenges of doing business in a country run by a repressive single party government, including by being prepared to stand in strong defense of the freedom of expression of its employees, players, and affiliates across the globe,” read a letter sent to the league by a bipartisan group of United States lawmakers.The N.B.A. saw its brand battered in China and at home after a team executive waded into Chinese politics on Twitter.Tyrone Siu/ReutersThe letter’s signees — a cross-party group that included Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, a Democrat, and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, a Republican — accused the N.B.A. of compromising American values and effectively supporting Chinese propaganda.“If you’re angering both sides, it means there is no middle ground, which I think was significant,” said Dreyer, the Beijing-based sports analyst.Like other observers, Dreyer suggested the WTA’s stance was potentially game-changing. But he noted, too, that it was possibly easier for the WTA to defy China than it had been for, say, the N.B.A., for two reasons.First, because the pandemic had already forced the WTA to cancel its events in China for the near future, the tour was not necessarily forfeiting big sums of money in the immediate term. (Severing ties with China permanently would of course require the WTA Tour to replace tens of millions of dollars in revenue and prize money.) Second, because China has essentially erased any mention of Peng and the ensuing international outcry from its news and social media, the WTA’s brand may not take much of a hit there. Many in China simply do not know about Peng, or the WTA’s response.“With the N.B.A., they were burning jerseys,” Dreyer said. “You don’t have that reaction against tennis.”To be sure, big sports leagues that have deep, longstanding interests in China, barring some extreme turn of events, will not exit the market any time soon. And some organizations are still going all-in.The I.O.C., which will stage the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing in February, has tuned out any and all calls from critics for the organization to make some statement about China’s human rights abuses, including the treatment of religious minorities in the country’s western regions.The Beijing Olympics marked the start of its 100-days-out countdown on Wednesday.Andrea Verdelli/Getty ImagesFormula 1 this month announced that it had signed a deal to continue the Chinese Grand Prix, an annual race in Shanghai, through 2025, and the Premier League appears to have patched over a crisis that began when a top player infuriated China by criticizing its human rights record.Some in the industry, though, have already noticed a change, a slight cooling, among other companies pondering business in the sports market there.“With increased political tension and the complications of doing business in China, I’ve seen more companies focus back on Europe and the U.S., where the reward may not be as large but the risk is much less,” said Lisa Delpy Neirotti, an international sports marketing consultant and director of the sports management master’s program at George Washington University.That dynamic has been vivid in European soccer, which had collectively seemed to view China as a sort of El Dorado five years ago, but now seems to be coming to terms with reality after a series of disappointments. In Italy, Inter Milan, one of that country’s most storied clubs, is in a tailspin after its Chinese owner, Suning, a consumer goods company, became engulfed in a major financial crisis. The team has been forced to sell player contracts to meet its payroll.In England, the Premier League remains in litigation with a broadcast partner that failed to pay up after signing a record-breaking television deal to broadcast games in China. A new partner is paying a fraction of the previous agreement, leaving some clubs disillusioned.Manchester City’s Bernardo Silva in Shanghai in 2019. The Premier League had to find a new television partner in China after a record-setting deal collapsed.Hector Retamal/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“Over the last five years there had been a perception in the West that China is there for the taking — there’s lots of money, economic growth is strong, a growing middle class, disposal income, and we can go feast on this,” Chadwick said. “What has happened for some sports organizations in the West is that they have not found China as lucrative as they imagined, and they have also found China incredibly difficult to do business with.”The difficulties appear to be deepening.Half a decade ago, the Chinese government, emboldened about sports after hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, announced plans to create an $800 billion domestic sports industry, the largest in the world. That captured the attention of Western sports organizations.What many organizations did not anticipate, though, were the peculiarities of the Chinese business landscape, the extent to which politics is woven through all aspects of China’s economy, and the growing spirit of nationalism under its increasingly autocratic president, Xi.“I absolutely think over the long term that major sporting events will be hesitant moving forward to schedule out in China right now,” said Thomas A. Baker III, a sports management professor at the University of Georgia who has done extensive work in China. “The China that welcomed the world in 2008 is not the same China that people are doing business with in 2021.”Tariq Panja More

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      in Tennis

      Where Is Peng Shuai? The Question the I.O.C. Is Too Weak To Ask.

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      Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai went missing after publicly accusing a former government official of sexual assault. Tennis stars, led by Naomi Osaka, and the WTA have all asked #whereispengshuai?Where is Peng Shuai?That’s the question the International Olympic Committee and its president, Thomas Bach, should be shouting right now — loud, demanding, and aimed squarely at the leadership in China, set to host the Beijing Games in February. But instead of firm demands, we’re hearing not much more than faint, servile whispers from Olympic leadership.Peng, 35, a Chinese tennis star and three-time Olympian, has been missing since Nov. 2, when she used social media to accuse Zhang Gaoli, 75, a former vice premier of China, of sexually assaulting her at his home three years ago. She also described having had an on-and-off consensual relationship with Zhang.Peng wrote that the assault occurred after Zhang invited her to play tennis at his home. “I was so scared that afternoon,” she noted. “I never gave consent, crying the entire time.”“I feel like a walking corpse,” she added.The message was quickly deleted from China’s government-controlled social media site.There have been no verifiable signs of Peng since — no videos or photographs to prove she is safe. Instead, all the outside world has seen is a stilted message, said to have been written by Peng and sent to the WTA, in response to its demand for an inquiry into her allegations. Peng’s supposed response, released by China’s state-owned broadcaster on Wednesday, immediately raised concerns.“Hello everyone this is Peng Shuai,” it read, before calling her accusation of sexual assault, made just weeks ago, untrue. “I’m not missing, nor am I unsafe. I’ve been resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me.”It reads like a message from a hostage, a natural concern given the Chinese government’s long history of using force and heavy-handed pressure to crush dissent and flatten those it deems guilty of going against the state.So, what has been the I.O.C.’s response to a potentially endangered Olympian? A neutered, obsequious statement.“We have seen the latest reports and are encouraged by assurances that she is safe,” read an official I.O.C. declaration on Thursday.What world of fantasy is the I.O.C. living in? Given China’s history, we can reasonably assume the latest missive supposedly written by Peng is a fraud. Peng dared to speak up with force and candor, but not the I.O.C., a Swiss-based organization with a history of cowing to dictators that goes back to Adolf Hitler and the 1936 Summer Games.After some criticism, the committee followed up with another statement, hinting its representatives were talking to the Chinese.“Experience shows that quiet diplomacy offers the best opportunity to find a solution for questions of such nature,” it said, offering no evidence of prior success. “This explains why the IOC will not comment any further at this stage.”Responding to a message purportedly written by Peng, the I.O.C. said in a statement, “We have seen the latest reports and are encouraged by assurances that she is safe.” Valery Gache/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBach and the wide cast of leadership at the I.O.C. typically use every chance possible to claim the Olympic mission stands for humanity’s highest ideals. They say all Olympic athletes are part of a family. Peng was among those ranks in 2008, 2012 and 2016. Once an Olympian, they say, always an Olympian.That’s an admirable idea, but it gets tossed to the wayside when the stakes grow too high.Looming are Beijing’s Winter Games, fueled by huge fees for broadcasting rights and corporate sponsorships and the billions spent by the Chinese government in an effort to gain respect on the international stage.Do Bach and the I.O.C. have the guts to stand up for one of their own and call out the dictatorial host of its next showcase for a frightening human rights abuse?The answer, so far at least, is no.Contrary to the official I.O.C. statement, nothing is encouraging about this situation.Not if you know the long history of Chinese authoritarianism. Not if you know how it has been hammering at dissent and silencing anyone with enough clout to threaten national order — including prominent cultural and business figures like Jack Ma, founder of the internet firm Alibaba.Not if you know about how China has suppressed protest in Hong Kong and Tibet, or if you pay attention to the treatment of Muslim minorities — deemed genocide by the United Nations and dozens of nations, including the United States — despite Chinese denials.As predicted by critics, or anyone watching with even a bit of common sense, the I.O.C. finds itself compromised. That’s the cost of cozying up to authoritarian hosts like China, which held the Summer Games in 2008, and Russia, the site of the 2014 Winter Games.Compare the typical fecklessness of Bach and the I.O.C. with the uncompromising approach taken by the women’s pro tennis tour, which has been unafraid to stand up boldly for Peng, a former world No. 1 in doubles.“I have a hard time believing that Peng Shuai actually wrote the email we received or believe what is being attributed to her,” wrote Steve Simon, chief executive of the WTA Tour, in a statement. “Peng Shuai displayed incredible courage in describing an allegation of sexual assault against a former top official in the Chinese government.”Simon continued: “Peng Shuai must be allowed to speak freely, without coercion or intimidation from any source. Her allegation of sexual assault must be respected, investigated with full transparency and without censorship.The voices of women need to be heard and respected, not censored nor dictated to.”That’s putting people over profit. That’s guts. Professional tennis in China is a lucrative, fast-growing market. The men’s and women’s tours hold high-profile tournaments there, and the WTA Finals are slated for Shenzhen in 2022.Given the way female tennis players have long led on matters of human rights, it is no surprise that Billie Jean King, Serena Williams, Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova have stood strongly for Peng. And it is no surprise younger stars have followed suit, led by Naomi Osaka, the torch bearer in the Tokyo Games this past summer, who has added her significant stature to the chorus asking “Where is Peng Shuai?”But Bach and the I.O.C., peddlers of Olympic mythology, have yet to join that chorus. Peng Shuai is part of the Olympic family, but the I.O.C. overlords lack the spine to stand up for one of their own. More

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      in Soccer

      Olympics Power Broker Convicted in Forgery Case

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      Sheikh Ahmad al-Sabah of Kuwait faces possible jail time, pending an appeal.GENEVA — Ahmad al-Sabah, a Kuwaiti sheikh who for years has been one of the most influential power brokers in global sports, faces more than a year in prison after being convicted in a forgery case in Switzerland.Sheikh Ahmad was found guilty along with four others in a case in which prosecutors successfully argued that he was the mastermind of a complex plot to implicate another member of the Kuwaiti royal family in a scheme to overthrow the country’s ruler.Sheikh Ahmad was in the wood-paneled court as the sentence was read out by the presiding judge. He said he would appeal the ruling and declared his innocence as he prepared to leave the court. The judgment not only threatens his liberty but also his future role in sports, where his influence has stretched from the upper echelons of the International Olympic Committee to the top of world soccer and beyond.“I know I didn’t do anything; I will wait for the appeal,” Sheikh Ahmad told reporters at the court. “I will never stop, because I believe I am innocent.”The case is not the only legal issue that has blighted Sheikh Ahmad in recent years. He is also an indicted co-conspirator in a United States Department of Justice corruption case that led to the conviction of a senior soccer official in 2017. Sheikh Ahmad subsequently resigned from FIFA’s ruling council and pledged to withdraw from soccer while the case was being litigated.Since November 2018 he has been declared “self suspended” by the International Olympic Committee after the charges that led to Friday’s court ruling. Until then he had been a key lieutenant to the I.O.C.’s president Thomas Bach, whose election victory in 2013 he helped to mastermind by securing key votes. He is also credited with winning support for Tokyo’s bid to stage the recently completed 2020 Olympics.Much of Sheikh Ahmad’s power stems from his control of the Olympic Council of Asia, a body set up by his father 40 years ago. Despite relinquishing all his other official roles in sports as the allegations and accusations mounted, Ahmad continued to lead that organization until Friday, when the group said that he would “step aside temporarily.”Prosecutors in Geneva successfully argued that Sheikh Ahmad, his English former lawyer, a Kuwaiti aide and two more Swiss-based lawyers orchestrated a sham arbitration case in order to frame other royals in a coup plot.“It’s very strange, I’ve been a long time as a criminal lawyer in Geneva; it’s the first time I’ve seen a sham arbitration,” said Pascal Maurer, the lawyer for Nasser al Mohammed al Sabah, a former prime minister of Kuwait who was one of the figures Sheikh Ahmad tried to frame.“It was very sophisticated in the way they planned it, but it was not very sophisticated in the way they realized it because they made many mistakes in their organization and in the way they forged documents.”For the I.O.C., the case is another embarrassing episode involving one of its most senior figures. The organization said it would not take action against Sheikh Ahmad because he had decided to suspend himself. Sheikh Ahmad’s only character witness was scheduled to be Francois Carrard, the I.O.C.’s longtime former director general who continues to serve as its legal adviser. Mr. Carrard did not show up in court last Thursday, with the court citing an unspecified medical issue.Despite his legal troubles, Sheikh Ahmad has continued to play an influential role in sports behind the scenes.A candidate for a seat on FIFA’s governing council claimed that she was told she did not stand a chance of winning because Sheikh Ahmad had already decided that a rival candidate from Bangladesh should retain the seat.In April, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, also based in Switzerland, sided with the woman, Mariyam Mohamed, a soccer official from the Maldives, and agreed that Sheikh Ahmad had actively interfered in the elections held in 2019 by the Asian Football Confederation to achieve his desired outcome.Mohamed told the court that she was told to drop her candidacy and that in return Ahmad would use his influence in international soccer circles to obtain any other position of her choosing at the A.F.C. or FIFA.Sheikh Ahmad’s influence has also stretched beyond the sports world. As a senior Kuwaiti royal he has been a government minister, and he was also Secretary General of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the influential cartel for oil producing nations.At the height of his power, the sheikh, known for his burly security entourage, was a magnet for sports officials looking to secure highly sought after committee roles and other sinecures. He spent decades building his portfolio, which started from running the Asian Olympic body after the murder of his father during the 1990 invasion of Kuwait by Iraq. His roles multiplied rapidly and at one point numbered almost a dozen. More