Directing Diplomacy

Can Steven Spielberg take credit for China's new stand on Darfur. Under pressure from human-rights activists, the Schindler's List director threatened to quit his post as artistic advisor to the 2008 Beijing Olympics unless China, Sudan's largest oil customer and constant defender, took a harder line toward the genocide in Sudan's Darfur region. Just days after Spielberg's threat, China finally backed a U.N. resolution that will send 26,000 peacekeepers to Darfur. China's Olympic committee denied China knew that Spielberg would possibly quit. "I had not heard that," the director of cultural activities said.