SINGAPORE, July 8: The equestrian events at the 2008 Beijing Olympics will be staged in Hong Kong, Games organisers said on Friday. The Beijing team, giving a presentation to International Olympic Committee members, said an agreement had been signed between the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) and organisers, witnessed by the IOC.

The FEI had consistently opposed the Beijing organising committee’s plan to relocate the events to the former British colony which was handed back to China in 1997.

Beijing officials had said moving the events was necessary because of “uncertainties of equine diseases and major difficulties in establishing a disease-free zone”.—Reuters