Kelley Currie, former U.S. ambassador-at-large for global women’s issues, was among many critics dismayed that the IOC would be so ready to accept that Peng was OK.

“It was typical IOC: take the Chinese Communist Party at its word despite all evidence to the contrary,” said Currie, who also served as the U.S. representative on the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. She called the IOC response “self-serving and hypocritical” and accused it of “participating in a blatant CCP propaganda damage-control effort.”…

What makes this incident stand out, Yaqiu Wang, senior China researcher for Human Rights Watch, said is that the IOC is “not just keeping mum about human rights abuses; they are playing an active role in the narrative that the Chinese government is orchestrating.”