THE folks at Fidelity Investments shouldn't expect VIP seating at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The Boston-based company slashed its stake in PetroChina Co. amid pressure to sell shares of companies doing business in Sudan, which has been accused of supporting genocide in Darfur. Officials at China's biggest oil producer say it's no big deal, but who's buying that? Fidelity is only the world's largest mutual-fund operation.Bravo to Fidelity. It didn't cite the 2008 games specifically, yet with activists working to make the phrase "Genocide Olympics" part of investors' lexicon, China should expect more protest-sales of its assets.

The Olympics are supposed to be China's coming-out party. Asia's fastest-growing economy is sparing no expense to make sure the games are the grandest ever. The slogan for the event, "One World, One Dream," is meant to convey China's pivotal — and growing — role in the global community.

Instead, China may face a public-relations nightmare over its support of Sudan's pariah regime. If China doesn't tame the growing outcry, it could be hosting the most controversial Olympics since Moscow in 1980 or maybe even Berlin in 1936.

Sound like an exaggeration? At the moment, perhaps it does, yet this issue is growing legs, and fast. There's even a role in it for legendary film director Steven Spielberg, driving home the point that the public eye is turning toward China's role in the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

Investors could play a key role, too: Getting China to push Sudan to end the bloodshed. Fidelity's recent move to trim by at least 38 percent its stake in PetroChina, which has been developing oil fields in Sudan since 1996, is a case in point.

Warren Buffett should follow Fidelity's lead and instruct his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. to sell its stake in PetroChina. To many, Buffett is an investment god. If he wanted out of Sudan, he could convince shareholders. It also would be nice to see Fidelity go even further to divest itself of PetroChina.

Much of the world is scared senseless of crossing China. Look at how Google Inc., Yahoo! Inc., Microsoft Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and others have tripped over each other helping the Communist Party censor the internet. Governments such as the US will go to war supposedly to bring democracy to the Middle East, while essentially selling out democratic Taiwan.

Here, China's philosophy of non-interference in the sovereign affairs of trading partners won't cut it. Its ties with Sudan are cracking Beijing's criticism armour, especially ahead of the all-important Olympics.

President Hu Jintao disputes the notion that China is in any way shielding Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir from international pressure. According to the United Nations, the bloodshed has caused the deaths of more than 200,000 people and displaced more than 2 million.

Human-rights activists say Sudan uses much of its oil proceeds to buy weapons and aircraft, which then wind up in the hands of militia forces committing the atrocities. China also is a major arms supplier to the African nation.

This isn't a moral dilemma, like whether to invest in tobacco companies. Genocide is genocide and investors should think long and hard before profiting from it. As long as Sudan has China to protect it from global meddling, boost its economy and supply arms, al-Bashir's regime has a free hand.