Republic of China at the Olympics Republic of China at the Olympics The Republic of China (ROC) participated in its first Summer Olympics in 1932 under the name of ""China"". After the Chinese Civil War the ROC retreated to the island of Taiwan, and only Taiwan-based athletes have competed on behalf of the country since then. The ROC protested the 1979 Nagoya Resolution by boycotting the 1976 Summer Olympics; this continued until the ROC competed under the deliberately ambiguous name ""Chinese Taipei"" in the 1984 Winter Olympics. China also took part in the Opening Ceremony of the 1924 Summer Olympics, but its four athletes (all tennis
Flag of the Republic of China PRC's position that the ROC is a defunct entity and that the ROC on Taiwan is illegitimate. The ban also effectively applies to spectators—during a Table Tennis final match at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, police arrested a Taiwanese student for waving the ROC flag. However, the symbolism of the flag began to shift in the early 21st century as there was a warming of relations between the pan-Blue coalition in Taiwan and the Communist Party of China on mainland China. The flag of the Republic of China has begun to symbolize the existence of a past and possibly future unified