Jump to content

IOC lifts ban on Iraqi athletes participating in the Beijing Olympics

Edit links
Unchecked
From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Related articles
Location of Iraq
Collaborate!
Iraq
Iraq

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has lifted a ban on Iraqi athletes participating in the Beijing Olympics. The IOC placed a ban on the country's participation on July 24 claiming a political influence within Iraq's national Olympic committee. This came after the Iraqi government's suspension of the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Iraq in May 2008.

File:LogoBeijing2008.jpg

The 2008 Summer Olympics Logo
(Image missing from Commons: image; log)

The decision to remove the ban is a result of the Iraqi government's agreement to allow free elections for their National Olympic Committee while under international scrutiny. "The National Olympic Committee will have fair elections before the end of November," said Pere Miro, Director of the IOC's relation with NOC's. In the meantime, Iraq's NOC will be run by a interim Committee approved by the IOC.

Even though the ban has been lifted, five of the seven athletes are still unable to participate due to the final date of selections having passed. Two athletes participating in sprinting and rowing are expected to compete.

There has been some who believed that Iraq has been treated wrongly in the matter of their NOC. Ahmed Tabour, head of the Cultural and Sports Committee stated that "Iraq was never suspended during the days of Saddam [Hussein], who personally appointed the national Olympic committee. The Iraqi people need hope, and sport gives them a lot of hope."


[edit]

Sources

[edit]

Share this:  E-mail this story Share on Facebook Share on reddit.com Share on LinkedIn.com Share on twitter.com



This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License
Retrieved from "https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/IOC_lifts_ban_on_Iraqi_athletes_participating_in_the_Beijing_Olympics"