The event is scheduled for July 24-Aug. 9. Olympic body, Japan promise decision within month
Canada and Australia both bluntly said they would not participate this year
JEDDAH: Olympics chiefs have postponed the 2020 Games due to begin in Tokyo in July, International Olympic Committee member Dick Pound said on Monday.
Australia and Canada had already withdrawn earlier in the day as organizers came under global pressure to call off the event because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“On the basis of the information the IOC has, postponement has been decided,” Pound said. “The parameters going forward have not been determined, but the Games are not going to start on July 24, that much I know.”
This July 23, 2018, photo provided by Mobile Mosque Executive Committee, shows Mobile Mosque, a mosque on wheels with the capacity for up to 50 people at Toyota Stadium in Toyota, western Japan. As Japan prepares to host visitors from around the world for the Summer Olympics in 2020, a Tokyo sports and cultural events company has created a mosque on wheels that its head hopes will make Muslim visitors feel at home. (Mobile Mosque Executive Committee via AP)
“On the basis of the information the IOC has, postponement has been decided,” Pound said. “The parameters going forward have not been determined, but the Games are not going to start on July 24, that much I know.”
The event, scheduled for July 24-Aug. 9, is now likely to be held in 2021, with the details to be worked out in the next four weeks.
More than 337,000 people worldwide have been infected by the novel coronavirus and over 14,600 have died in a pandemic that the World Health Organization said was accelerating.
The IOC and the Japanese government have both edged back from weeks of blanket insistence the Games would go ahead, announcing a month-long consultation on scenarios including postponement.
The Olympics have never been delayed before, though they were canceled in 1916, 1940 and 1944 during the two world wars, and major Cold War boycotts disrupted the Moscow and Los Angeles Games in 1980 and 1984.