Monday Memo: Paris 2024 Inspection, Koreas Meet at IOC, Olympic Day

IOC in Paris

The IOC Coordination Commission for the 2024 Olympics in Paris will hold its second meeting June 18 and 19. The 16 member group is led by IOC member in Belgium Pierre-Olivier Beckers-Vieujant.

The commission meets just as Paris faces warning signs that costs could be spiraling on the two biggest projects, an aquatic center and the Olympic Village.

With Los Angeles selected to host the 2028 Summer Games, LA vice chair Janet Evans will be one of three observers from the US organizing committee at the Paris meeting.

Korea Talks

Korean government officials will meet June 18 to discuss joint teams for the 2018 Asian Games. The talks will be in the village of Panmunjom in the Korean Demilitarized Zone.

Olympic Council of Asia President Sheikh Ahmad met with leaders of the North and South Korean National Olympic Committees last month. It was decided that joint Korean teams would be allowed for the Jakarta 2018 Asian Games only in sports where extra competition spots would not need to be awarded.

Koreas, Japan, China at IOC

The IOC has invited leaders from the Chinese, North Korean, South Korean, and Japanese National Olympic Committees for a meeting on June 22 in Lausanne. An exhibition match of table tennis stars from all four nationsis set for the next day, June 23, Olympic Day.

"This meeting is another step by Olympic sport to promote dialogue on and around the Korean peninsula," said IOC President Thomas Bach when he announced the meeting earlier this month.

"Sport must continue tobuild bridges and show what it can do to bring people together. Japan and China will be the next hosts of the Olympic Games and Olympic Winter Games, and these mixed teams including athletes from North and South Korea, Japan and China, and the exhibition match, give us a glimpse of how sport can unite and make a contribution to changing the world through sport," said the IOC president.

Olympic Day

June 23 is the anniversary of the founding of the IOC in Paris in 1894. As is traditional, hundreds of sports events around the world hosted by National Olympic Committees mark the day.

In Lausanne, in addition to the Asian table tennis friendly, the IOC will organize a tango demonstration as a prelude to the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires in October and live music with Swiss Olympic snowboarder and artist Pat Burgener. And most importantly during World Cup, a live broadcast of the Switzerland / Serbia match.

WADA Travels to Asia Anti-Doping Summit

Representatives from 29 countries are meeting in Colombo, Sri Lanka, June 18 and 19 for the annual Asia/Oceania Region Intergovernmental Ministerial Meeting on Anti-Doping in Sport.

WADA chairman Craig Reedie and other executives from the agency will also take part in this fifteenth annual meeting.

"This is an important meeting for the region and the global anti-doping movement. Asia/Oceania is a part of the world that is growing in importance from a sporting point of view. Asia alone comprises around 60% of the world’s population and 80% of the world's youth, a fact that has not escaped the leaders of many of the world’s biggest sports," says Reedie.

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