Special report:   2008 Olympic Games

    NAIROBI, April 21 (Xinhua) -- Kenya's former marathon world record holder Paul Tergat on Monday called on International Olympic Committee member countries to ignore calls to boycott this year's summer Olympic Games scheduled for August in Beijing due to the political disturbances in Tibet.

    Tergat told a news conference in Nairobi that as an athlete, he was opposed to using sports as a tool for settling political scores.

    "Olympic Games come around every four years, and it is the crowing moment for any athlete to participate in the Games, therefore by denying sports men and women the opportunity participates in the Games, we are only shattering their long cherished dreams," he told journalists in Nairobi.

    The marathon star gave as an example the case of two of his countrymen great runners, Henry Rono and Mike Boit, both of whom missed the opportunity of competing at an Olympic Games due to a boycott by the United States and its allies of the Moscow Games.

    Rono broke four world records in a span of three months but missed out on the Olympic Games when Kenya boycotted the games in protest to the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan.

    Tergat also called upon his fellow sports people not to miss out on the Games because of the pollution in Beijing.