KUALA LUMPUR: A day after the high-profile vote which awarded Beijing the 2022 Winter Games, Inter­national Olympic Committee (IOC) members dealt on Sat­urday with issues affecting the next two Summer Games — severe water pollution in Rio de Janeiro and the fuss over Tokyo’s choice of emblem.

Earlier this month, the Japanese government threw out the design plans for the main stadium for the 2020 Tokyo Games amid public criticism of the $2 billion price tag, which was nearly double the original estimate and would have made it the most expensive stadium ever.

Tokyo organising committee head Yoshio Mori later apologised, a gesture IOC presi­dent Thomas Bach said on Saturday wasn’t really necessary.

But Tokyo officials now find themselves involved in another controversy over an emblem they unveiled — it’s based on a “T,” standing for Tokyo, team and tomorrow. But the 2013 logo for a theatre in Liege, Belgium, has similar shapes in white against a black backdrop and the designer of that logo says it will approach the IOC and ask them to change it.

IOC vice-president John Coates of Australia, who heads the coordination commission for Tokyo, said the IOC did everything ahead of the emblem’s unveiling.

On Rio’s polluted water issues, Brazilian organising committee chief Carlos Nuzman said he isn’t planning any changes. “I can confirm here the sailing competition will not be moved to any other venue,” he said.

Rio spokesman Mario And­ra­da promised the organising committee would do more in the rest of 2015 and early next year to clean up floating waste in Guanabara Bay and other waterways.

Published in Dawn, August 2nd, 2015

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