Curiouser and curiouser
- 10 Apr 08, 09:18 AM
Downing Street sources insist that the Chinese government were never in any doubt that Gordon Brown intended to attend the closing ceremony of the Olympic Games. They say that the prime minister made this clear to China's Premier Wen when they met recently in Beijing. What's more, a letter sent by China's ambassador to London on the 5th of April informs No 10 that the Chinese premier was looking forward to welcoming the PM at the closing ceremony.
The plan, they insist (and the London Organising Committee back this up), was always for Brown and the mayor of London to go the closing ceremony and Princess Anne and the Olympics Minister, Tessa Jowell, to go to the opening ceremony. Maybe, but that's not the impression they created right around the world.
It was explicitly stated in China's official Xinhua agency reports on several occasions that Brown was going to the opening ceremony. Xinhua is not known for its Downing Street sources. It gets its information from the Chinese government.
British newspapers have repeatedly reported calls for Brown to abandon plans to attend the opening ceremony.
Last night Hillary Clinton praised her friend for boycotting the opening ceremony.
Sources claim that the public confusion about Mr Brown's plans stems from the fact that he regarded the only important question as being whether countries boycotted the Games or not - whether that be this or that ceremony or, indeed, the Games themselves. The PM feared that an answer pointing out that he wasn't, in fact, planning to go to one ceremony but was planning to go to another would look like he was trying to have it both ways.
He spotted the right danger but made a huge miscalculation about how to avoid it.
