Welcome to the family
The tiny western Pacific nation of the Marshall Islands is hoping to send athletes to Beijing following an International Olympic Committee announcement that they will likely be admitted to the Olympic family next year. Olympic membership for the country of 55,000 people would bring funding for sports, offer training opportunities and guarantee up to six athletes and two administrators could go to Beijing games, an IOC official said. There are currently 202 countries and territories in the Olympic family.
New Year greetings
Air China will use aircraft adorned with the Beijing Olympic logo and 'One World, One Dream' slogan on direct chartered flights across the Taiwan Straits during the upcoming Chinese New Year. Passengers will be presented with Olympic mascots and souvenirs, officials of the airline said. As part of the diplomatic negotiations to permit the symbolic flights once a year, both sides agreed to send planes that were not marked with national flags. For its part, Taiwan has got the claws out, responding to word of Beijing's Olympic plane by saying it will be sending back one covered in 'Hello Kitty' images.
Time to crack down
Hollywood's top lobbyist has urged Beijing to crack down on movie piracy and open its markets to more American-made films by the 2008 Olympics. Dan Glickman from the Motion Picture Association of America said the Olympics is a perfect time to prove the nation's commitment to ending copyright piracy and opening its markets. 'It is virtually impossible to find counterfeit Olympics goods in China. Why? As one of the Chinese officials said, it is because fakes dilute the value of the logo, the intellectual property upon which the Chinese have invested to finance the games,' he said. 'I would like to plant this challenge: by 2008, to have more legal than illegal DVDs sold in China, to have more American movies in Chinese theatres and to have more Chinese movies in American theatres.'
