The Tokyo Olympic Games will begin on 23 July, 2021 and run to 8 August after being delayed for a year because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) executive board met on Monday to decide.
The Olympics will still be called Tokyo 2020 despite taking place in2021
The Paralympic Games, originally due to begin on 24 August, 2020, will now occur between 24 August and 5 September, 2021.
IOC president Thomas Bach stated: “I am positive that, working together with the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, the Japanese Government and all our stakeholders, we can master this unprecedented difficulty.
” Mankind currently discovers itself in a dark tunnel. These Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 can be a light at the end of this tunnel.”
International Paralympic Committee president Andrew Parsons added: “When the Paralympic Games do take place in Tokyo next year, they will be an extra-special display screen of humankind uniting as one, an international celebration of human resilience and an astonishing showcase of sport.
” With the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games 512 days away, the concern for all those involved in the Paralympic movement must be to focus on remaining safe with their friends and family throughout this extraordinary and hard time.”
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The choice to hold off both events was required to safeguard the health of the professional athletes and everyone included, and to support the containment of the Covid-19 virus.
The new dates also considered the remainder of the worldwide