February 24, 2007	Saturday	Safar 6, 1428

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SOCHI (Russia), Feb 23: International Olympic Committee (IOC) evaluation commission head Chiharu Igaya said Friday that the application of Russian resort city Sochi to host the 2014 Olympics was a unique bid.

“This project is a really unique bid from the city, where the palms and the warm sea neighbour snow-covered mountains,” the Japanese IOC vice-president told a news conference.

The IOC evaluation squad have just finished their five-day inspection of the Black Sea resort, which is in a battle against Korean mountain town Pyeongchang, which narrowly missed out to Vancouver for the 2010 Games, and Salzburg in Austria.

Igaya stressed that Sochi's bid had several strong points, including tremendous government support from Russian President Vladimir Putin and also from the people.

“The second strong point that we should take into consideration is that the winter sports traditions in Russia are great,” Igaya said, naming the compactness of the city's project as another strength of the bid.

However, the head of the IOC panel mentioned that time factors may become a strong challenge for the organisers if Sochi wins the right to hold the Games.

“Time factors may be really pressing as the organisers have plenty of construction work to be done here, while there are only seven years to go,”Igaya told the press.

He also said contradictions between the bidders and environmentalists could affect the application, although he added that he was confident the two sides would work out a compromise.

Igaya also moved to quash concerns about Sochi's ability to avoid any terrorist incidents given its proximity to breakaway Georgian territory Abkhazia.

“Russia has a good record of effective security measures. I believe they are capable of holding peacefull Games,” Igaya said in conclusion.

The evaluation commission will make their last stop in Salzburg, Austria on March 14-17.

The commission will report back to the IOC by early June, one month before the host city is chosen by the Olympic authority's 111 members at their session in Guatemala on July 4. —AFP