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London 2012 Olympics:
ROC flag warning sparks outrage
¡¥SELF-CASTRATION¡¦: A warning to not wave the
flag at the Olympics was issued by officials and was labeled by many netizens as
an insult to Taiwanese sovereignty
By Loa Iok-sin / Staff Reporter
Netizens slammed the Sports Affairs Council (SAC) and the Tourism Bureau over
their ¡§friendly reminders¡¨ to Taiwanese travelers planning to attend the Olympic
Games in London not to bring Republic of China (ROC) flags with them, saying the
move was ¡§self-degrading¡¨ to Taiwanese sovereignty.
Last week, the Taipei Association of Travel Agents (TATA) posted an announcement
on its Web site, informing its members that if they are taking tour groups to
attend the Olympic Games in London to be aware of the ¡§Olympic model.¡¨
The ¡§Olympic model¡¨ refers to an agreement reached between Taiwan and the
International Olympic Committee that only the name ¡§Chinese Taipei¡¨ ¡X not
¡§Taiwan¡¨ or ¡§ROC¡¨ ¡X can be used at Olympic venues and that only the Chinese
Taipei Olympic Committee flag ¡X not the ROC flag ¡X can be used at Olympic
events.
¡§According to regulations, items prohibited in the venues include flags of
non-competing countries (our Olympic team uses the Chinese Taipei Olympic
Committee flag),¡¨ the announcement said.
¡§In order to prevent unnecessary disputes because travelers are not aware of the
regulations, please contact the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee to send a
representative to explain the Olympic model to those taking part in Olympic
Games tour groups,¡¨ it added.
The announcement was delivered to the organization from the SAC through the
Tourism Bureau.
¡§I guess this is what people would call ¡¥self-castration,¡¦¡¨ netizen Alain Chen
said about the announcement on his Facebook page.
¡§If you look down on yourself, how do you expect others to respect you?¡¨ asked
Jennifer Lin, another Facebook user.
Mimiko (¦ÌªG), a writer, posted a photo that she took during a World Baseball
Classic (WBC) games in 2009 in Tokyo, in which a group of Taiwanese baseball
fans held up a giant ROC flag in the audience on Facebook.
¡§I don¡¦t know what the announcement is supposed to mean, but I know that in the
WBC preliminary games of the Asia region, the organizers also applied the
Olympic model. The Taiwanese national team competed under the name ¡¥Chinese
Taipei¡¦ and used the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee flag, but this was what
happened in the audience when the Hymn to the National Flag was sung,¡¨ she
wrote. ¡§The tour guides who took the fans to the game didn¡¦t do anything, the
security of the Tokyo Dome didn¡¦t do anything and neither did the organizers ¡X
why is the Tourism Bureau so afraid?¡¨
Responding to the criticism, SAC Deputy Minister Chen Yun-lien (³¯¶³½¬) said it was
routine for the council to forward regulations on Olympic Games to the Tourism
Bureau, and that it was only a friendly reminder, denying that the act was
¡§self-degrading.¡¨
The announcement was removed from the TATA Web site yesterday afternoon.
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