Critics censure Russian rights record by snubbing Sochi Olympics (xpost from FA)

http://www.latimes.com/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-sochi-olympics-boycotts-protests-20140206,0,5641870.story

Critics censure Russian rights record by snubbing Sochi Olympics
By Carol J. Williams
February 6, 2014, 7:12 a.m.

MOSCOW -- Chinese President Xi Jinping will be there. So too will the United Nations’ top official, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

But Friday’s opening ceremony for the Olympic Winter Games in the Black Sea resort of Sochi will be notable for the absence of heads of state from the world’s leading democracies. President Obama, British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Francois Hollande and other Western dignitaries decided weeks ago to express their concern over Russia’s human rights record by skipping the inaugural gala.

Sweden’s Sports Minister Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth said last month that it was important for democratic leaders to issue a “political marker” on Russia’s human rights policies. Her Finnish counterpart, Paavo Arhinmaki, also announced that he would boycott the opening ceremony to show his dismay over "human rights violations, restrictions to freedom of speech and the oppression of sexual minorities."

Prominent athletes such as Austrian skiing sensation and Olympic gold medalist Hermann Maier, rejected invitations to Sochi on human rights grounds. Some countries, including the United States, chose to make their concern over the treatment of gays in Russia apparent by including homosexuals in their official delegations.