Tokyo (AFP)

The harmonious white and blue checkerboard of the Tokyo Olympic Games logo integrated into the threatening representation of the coronavirus: the image shocked in Japan and led the authors of this hijacking to apologize on Thursday.

This revisited representation of the Covid-19 was found on the cover of Number 1 Shimbun, the internal magazine of the Japanese Club of Foreign Correspondents (FCCJ).

Its president Khaldon Azhari announced that the satirical drawing had been removed from the FCCJ website.

"We are living through this crisis together and the cover of our magazine has offended some people in the host country, Japan," said Mr. Azhari, before presenting "his sincere regrets".

The coronavirus pandemic forced the organizers and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to postpone for one year the Tokyo Olympics which were to take place this summer in the Japanese capital.

In Japan, 16,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 contamination and 749 deaths have been recorded.

The head of the Tokyo Olympics organizing committee Toshiro Muto expressed his relief after the FCCJ decision: "We believe that this is the appropriate response, it is the response we expected", he said. he declares.

At the start of the week, a spokesperson for the organizing committee for the Olympic Games 2020 described the image as "very disappointing".

"It is particularly unwelcome for athletes who want to participate in the Tokyo Games next year and who work very hard every day to be there," said Masa Takaya.

He also noted that this diversion could expose its perpetrators to legal proceedings for intellectual property infringement.

In 2016, the organizers of the JO-2020 had unveiled the current logo, called checkerboard of harmony, after the removal of the previous symbol which strongly resembled that of a Liège theater in Belgium.

© 2020 AFP