Tokyo (AFP)
The new dates for the Tokyo Olympics, postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, are likely to be set "within a week," Japanese organizing committee chair Yoshiro Mori said on Monday.
"I think IOC President Thomas Bach will make an announcement this week" on this subject, said Mori at a press conference, adding that the possibility of competition in the spring or summer 2021 was studied.
Some media speculate that the organizers could take advantage of the postponement to make the competition rather be held in the spring, significantly more favorable than the summer from a climatic point of view.
The hot summer weather in the Japanese capital had pushed the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to relocate the flagship marathon event to Sapporo, in the far north of Japan, in order to limit the risks for the participants.
However, according to NHK public television, citing sources close to the organization, the Games could start on July 23, 2021, almost a year to the day after the date originally scheduled (July 24, 2020).
"We are facing an incalculable number of challenges, but the main one remains the question of the date. We must settle this point quickly and then move on to the others," added Yoshiro Mori.
The postponement of the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games because of the ongoing pandemic is unprecedented in the history of the modern Olympic Games in peacetime, and represents a colossal logistical challenge for the organizers.
This should also lead to a massive additional cost, according to the organizers, whose last estimate of the event's budget, at the end of 2019, was already 1,350 billion yen (11.5 billion euros) for the Japanese part.
"I think it is the mission of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee to ensure that the Games are held next year, as a sign of humanity's victory" over the virus, insisted Monday Mr. Mori .
© 2020 AFP