JO or not JO?
While uncertainty hangs over the competition initially scheduled in Tokyo, Japan, this summer, but postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) assures that they will take place in 2021.
In a telephone interview with AFP, the president of the IOC coordination committee for the Olympic Games-2020, affirmed that the Tokyo Games will take place "with or without" coronavirus and "will begin on July 23 of the year. next ”.
"It will be the Games that have defeated the Covid, the light at the end of the tunnel," said John Coates.
The theme will be "reconstruction from the devastation caused by the tsunami," he said, referring to the earthquake and tsunami that devastated northeastern Japan in 2011.
A majority of Japanese for a postponement or cancellation
The Games have so far only been canceled in times of war.
Those of Tokyo-2020 were initially to be inaugurated on July 24.
But the organizers made the historic decision in March to postpone them until the summer of 2021, as the Covid-19 progressed around the world.
The Japanese authorities have made it clear that they do not want the Games to be postponed a second time.
Japan's borders remain largely closed to foreigners.
Many experts also doubt that the pandemic will be under control by next summer.
According to several recent polls, a clear majority of Japanese want a further postponement or cancellation.
John Coates stressed that the Japanese government "has not given up at all", despite the "monumental task" of this one-year delay.
“Before the Covid,
(IOC President)
Thomas Bach said it was the best prepared Games we have ever seen, the venues were almost all finished, they are now finished, the village is amazing, […] everything is fine.
"
