Despite being tested more than athletes from other countries, Chinese Olympians' full cooperation with international anti-doping efforts demonstrates that accusations of cheating are little more than a political smear campaign against the backdrop of U.S-China tensions, said a sports scholar.
The most recent data provided on the World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) website showed that in its list of the top ten countries with doping violations, China is at the bottom with just 0.2 percent. There were over 19,000 samples collected from Chinese athletes, the largest sampling of all listed countries.
In an exclusive interview with CGTN, Professor Liu Dongfeng, Dean of the Graduate School at Shanghai University of Sport, and Vice President of the International Sports Economists Association, said China's commitment to the fight against doping is evident in the high number of tests conducted on its athletes and their positive response to these measures.
"China's full cooperation with anti-doping efforts can be demonstrated by both the high number of drug tests during the recent Olympic Games as well as the responses of Chinese athletes to these tests. According to World Aquatics, the international governing body for swimming, Chinese swimmers were tested on average 21 times from January 1st to the start of the Paris Games, and in comparison, Australian and American swimmers were tested only four and six times on average, respectively," Liu said.
Last week, Chinese swimmer Pan Zhanle set a new world record as he stormed to victory in the men's 100m freestyle final at the Paris Olympics. The 19-year-old told reporters that he underwent 29 tests in 2023 and 21 tests since May this year, none of which tested positive.
Asked how he managed to achieve such impressive progress, the teenage athlete attributed his improvement in timing during the Olympics to hard work, commitment to clean sport discipline and the support of modern training methods.
Liu pointed out that Pan and other athletes, like butterfly and freestyle swimmer Zhang Yufei, have been active in promoting fair play.
"While in Paris, China was again the most frequently tested team, and the result itself showed high compliance with anti-doping regulations. Chinese athletes have also generally shown positive attitudes toward anti-doping, cooperating fully with testing procedures. For example, notable Chinese athletes, including both Pan Zhanle and Zhang Yufei have publicly endorsed clean sport and anti-doping efforts," said the professor.
The China Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) has criticized a New York Times report for politicizing doping issues, claiming it distorted facts and quoted relevant cases out of context. CHINADA and WADA provided detailed explanations following the news report last week that implied a cover-up of the cases.
China's top swimmer Zhang Yufei expressed concerns about potential bias against the Chinese team at the Paris Olympics due to such reports. "I think everyone should start to look at those real facts about the Chinese swimming team without 'colored glasses'," she said.
WADA chief Witold Banka says his organization plans to review the USA's Rodchenkov Anti-Doping Act, which enables US authorities to prosecute individuals involved in international doping fraud conspiracies. In an interview with AFP last month, Banka emphasized that WADA is an independent agency and U.S. can not use it as a tool in geopolitics.
In light of the trend of sports becoming overshadowed by geopolitical rivalry, Liu called for mutual respect and independent governance to mitigate the negative impacts of geopolitical tensions.
"Politicization of sport is not something new and against the backdrop of China-U.S. geopolitical rivalry, Olympic Games has been seen as another platform for some individuals in the U.S. to smear China and contain China's rights. This is a really unfortunate and also explains why the IOC has added a fourth pillar together to its original 'Faster, Higher, Stronger' motto," Liu said, referring to the addition of the word "together" to the motto in 2021.
"While sports can become a platform for geopolitical tensions, there are ways to mitigate this and promote the positive aspects of sports. By focusing on mutual respect, independent governance and the unifying power of sports, it is possible to reduce their negative impact and foster a more cooperative and peaceful international environment," said the professor.
"To the Chinese athletes, they should continue to work hard and concentrate on their performance and continue to win and win respect and friendship by winning more medals. Of course, clean medals," he said.
Expert warns against politicization of anti-doping efforts amid China-US geopolitical rivalry
Expert warns against politicization of anti-doping efforts amid China-US geopolitical rivalry
China will firmly fight against economic hegemony, advocate justice, and stick to the right path against the sweeping tariffs by the United States, and will open ever wider to the world no matter how the international situation changes, according to a commentary of The Real Point published on Sunday.
An edited English version of the commentary is as follows:
In response to the U.S. imposition of "reciprocal tariffs" on all trading partners, China issued the Chinese Governments Position on Opposing U.S. Abuse of Tariffs on Saturday, after taking a series of countermeasures.
The thousand-word document pointed out that the United States uses tariffs as a weapon to exert extreme pressure and pursue its own selfish interests, which is a typical act of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying.
The paper also emphasized that China does not provoke trouble but is not afraid of trouble, and will continue to implement a high-level trade and investment liberalization and facilitation policy to share development opportunities and achieve mutual benefit and win-win results with countries around the world.
Li Haidong, a professor at China Foreign Affairs University, told The Real Point that this position paper demonstrates China's high sense of responsibility to uphold fairness and justice without fear of power politics, which will be conducive to the efforts of the international community to pool together resultant forces and continue promoting economic globalization.
Meanwhile, China's determination to promote high-level opening-up has boosted the courage and confidence of other countries to fight against unilateral bullying and injected certainty into a changing and turbulent world, according to Li.
There are no winners in a trade war and there is no way out for protectionism. When the U.S. complains that the whole world is taking advantage of it, it deliberately distorts a fact that the U.S. is the biggest beneficiary of the world's free trade system since the end of World War II.
Since the establishment of diplomatic relations with China in 1979, the United States has long been reaping substantial profits from its economic and trade ties with the country. More than 70,000 American companies have invested and started businesses in China, and exports to China supported 930,000 jobs in the United States, which maintained a huge surplus in service trade in particular.
According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, in 2023, the United States exported 46.72 billion U.S. dollars in services to China, and had a trade surplus of 26.57 billion U.S. dollars in services with China.
The Economist criticized the current U.S. trade policy for ignoring the unprecedented prosperity that globalization has brought to the United States.
The U.S. arbitrarily uses tariffs to blackmail other countries at will, attempting to sacrifice the interests of the whole world for U.S. hegemony. But any exertion of pressure and intimidation are useless to China.
This year, in the face of the continuous tariffs imposed by the United States, China has introduced a series of precise and effective measures, as one of the first countries taking countermeasures. The country's move is not only to safeguard its own sovereignty, security and development interests, but also to defend the multilateral trading system and international trade rules.
The world is not a jungle society, and everything must be fair and just. Development is a universal right of all countries in the world, not an exclusive right of a few countries.
The United States has unilaterally imposed tariffs on all its trading partners, violating the WTO's Most-Favored-Nation treatment principle and attempting to subvert the existing international economic and trade order. Its nature is to pursue "America first" and "America special" and deprive other countries of their legitimate right to development.
Over the past days, the European Union, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, Japan, Australia, Singapore, South Africa, Canada and other countries have been criticizing the United States.
China's position paper clearly states that "international affairs should be addressed through consultation, and the future of the world should be decided by all countries", reflecting the common aspirations of the international community and China's consistent position of speaking and doing fair things.
While the United States continues to build "high walls around a small yard" and erect tariff barriers, China is constantly "opening its doors" and "building bridges and roads" to bring more opportunities to the world.
On March 28, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with representatives of the international business community in Beijing and reiterated that China is determined to promote reform and opening up, China's door will only open wider, and China's policy of welcoming foreign investment has not changed and will not change.
The China Development Forum 2025, held in Beijing from March 23 to 24, attracted more than 80 representatives of multinational companies, among which American companies made up the largest proportion, reaching about one-third.
A report released by global management consulting firm Kearney shows that in the ranking of foreign direct investment confidence in the next three years, China has jumped from 7th to 3rd, and ranked first in the special ranking of emerging markets.
At a time when the world is in turmoil and the United States is abusively imposing tariffs, China's position paper sends a strong message to the world about maintaining the multilateral trading system and promoting economic globalization.
The world wants justice, not hegemony. This is China's clear declaration and the common voice of the international community.
China opposes hegemony, upholds right path against sweeping U.S. tariffs: commentary
