Because no Americans made it to the men's 1500-meter final, I had to stay up till 2:30 last night to see it on NBC. The premier event in track and field (always thrilling because it's 1200 meters of tactics giving way to 300 meters of all-out sprinting) was relegated to the late-late-show, after beach volleyball and BMX dirt bicycling. What else is new? James Fallows, who writes from China for the Atlantic, already warned us to expect highly nationalistic coverage of the Games, no matter whose broadcast; American television isn’t even the worst.

That’s not the subject of today's complaint. Here's my complaint: the Beijing Games have not gone a-flop. They’ve been a huge success. I certainly don’t begrudge the Chinese people their richly deserved kudos. What rankles me is that the Chinese government’s extremely effective full-court press against any negative moment marring the coming-out party has hardly been remarked upon.

By Vaclav Havel, Desmond Tutu, Wei Jingsheng and André Glucksmann

The selection of Beijing to organize and host the 2008 Olympic Games was accompanied by the Chinese government’s pledges of visible progress on respect for human rights. We understood these as a condition whose fulfillment the International Olympic Committee would demand. That is how this year’s Olympics could contribute to a greater openness and respect for international standards of human rights and liberties in the host country.

If the words of the Olympic Charter, stating that it is a goal of Olympism to "place sport at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity," are to be fulfilled, it is necessary for all Olympians to be able to learn about the real situation in China and to point out human rights violations freely whenever and wherever in line with their conscience. We call on the International Olympic Committee to make that possible.