Roundup: IOC Chief Visits Beijing as Games Takes BackseatThe 59-year-old Belgian, elected to top the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on July 16, boosted Beijing's confidence by predicting the Chinese capital to deliver a "best possible" Olympic Games in 2008. Rogge watched the men's platform diving final Monday night and awarded the gold medal to Tian Liang, who added a Universiade title to his Olympic gold. Tian celebrated his 22nd birthday by winning China's sixth diving gold with 725.49 points, beating second-placed Cuban Jose Guerra by an amazing margin of 81.45 points. World top table tennis player Wang Liqin paired up with Tie Yanan to take the mixed doubles final, routing South Korea's Park Sang-Joon and Ryu Ji-Hye by straight sets. Olympic judo champion Yuan Hua led China to beat Britain, taking the women's team top honor. Chinese swimmer Liang Shuang shared the women's 400m individual medley gold with Italian Federoca. Both clocked four minutes 45. 85 seconds. In the other swimming events, Poland's B. Kizierowski won the men's 50m freestyle, Czech Ilona Hlavackova got the women's 50m backstroke, Russian Irina Bespalova took the women's 100m butterfly, and Tara Kirk led Kristen Woodring to an American 1-2 finish in the women's 50m breastroke final, watched by the IOC president. Rogge spent half an hour answering reporters' questions Monday afternoon. He expressed full confidence that Beijing will deliver a "best possible" Olympic Games in 2008. Rogge added the IOC is "totally confident" that Beijing Games is in the position of putting on an excellent Games. "Of course I have not seen much of the installations, because I have just arrived here this morning," said Rogge. "But I am sure that the organizers of the 2008 Games will provide what is needed. " George Killian, president of the International University Sports Federation (FISU), who attended Rogge's conference, lavished praises on what Beijing has done for the Universiade. He said since the opening ceremony, "everything has been what we have expected." The IOC president reconfirmed its position that the IOC as a sporting body doesn't want to get involved in politics. Rogge said they will send a coordination commission to help Beijing's preparation for the 2008 Olympics and the body will only deal with sporting issues. "The task of the coordination commission is to take care of the sport aspect and prepare the Olympic Games as good as possible," he said, replying to a question on whether the IOC will use the coordination commission to monitor the human rights conditions of China. "The IOC is of course in favor of the best possible situation of human rights in all countries in the world," said Rogge. "But the IOC is not a political body, the IOC is a sports body." Beijing will build on experiences of the previous Games through a program of "Knowledge Transfer", said the president. "The reason for that (program) is that each Olympic organizer must start from zero and has no chance to rehearse and has no experience because this is something you organize once in a lifetime," said Rogge. "We have a program with all the information needed." But Rogge stressed that such information must be adapted to the local "economic, political, cultural and social environment". Rogge declined to go further on how the IOC will help Beijing. "It is here too soon for me to tell you exactly what help would be given to our friends in Beijing," Rogge said. Rogge also told reporters that the Olympiad needs to be scaled down to keep the Olympic Movement on the right track. "We would hope the Games in Beijing will be organized in an ideal size," said Rogge. "The Games in Sydney were the best ever, but we realized that the size of the Games is getting a little too big and is getting to the limit for the city can deliver." He said that the IOC therefore would study the way to reduce the cost and scale of the Games so that the money could be saved and the Games will become less complicated to stage. But the president stressed that the reform to the Olympic Games will be carried out without "touching the sporting size." "We will not diminish the number of sports, we will not diminish the number of athletes," said Rogge. On the IOC's choice of Olympic city, Rogge said the preference should go to the continent that has not staged the Games. But the preference is under the precondition that the candidates have the same quality, Rogge said, in response to a question if the IOC would copy the way of world soccer ruling body FIFA, which has decided to rotate the World Cup between continents after 2006. "The IOC would wish that the Games could be organized in continents that have not organized the Games like Africa or some other continents like Latin America," said Rogge. "They deserve to get the Games." But he added the Games has become too costly and too complicated for countries in these continents to organize the Games. "That is the reason why IOC want to review the costs and sophistication of the Games so that all the continents could organize the Games," he said. But as to whether the IOC will make the rotation between continents an obligation the president said that their position is "the quality goes first". "That means that in order to get the Games, the city of that continent must prove that they have the absolute quality to do that," he added. He also pointed out that to make the rotation obligatory would likely hurt the interests of the athletes. "The athletes would suffer. We go to the athletes first," he said. Rogge took the helm of the Olympic Movement on July 16, when Juan Antonio Samaranch retired after 21 years on the top. The new president told reporters that Samaranch, IOC honorary president for life, has been resting at home in Barcelona and is living a healthy and happy life. "He was in hospital for about a month but has been discharged this weekend," said Rogge. "He is resting at home, in good health, in good mood." Rogge mentioned his "constructive" meeting with Dick Pound, saying the Canadian member would continue to chair the IOC marketing commission. Rogge and Pound met privately for more than two hours last week in Rogge's office at IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, the first meeting of two since Rogge beat Pound and other three presidential candidates in Moscow. "I had a very good, constructive meeting with Mr. Pound," said Rogge. "He has not yet decided whether he would continue to chair the marketing commission." "We had agreed to meet again in about one month time," he added. Following his defeat in the presidential election, Pound resigned his powerful role as the marketing chief of the IOC and television rights negotiator. But he has already agreed to continue to serve as chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency, at least through next winter's Salt Lake City Games. On the opening day of track and field, defending champion Jay Y. Cumba of Cuba clinched the women's shot put gold while Keyan John Kanyi triumphed in the men's 10,000 meters. Russia was second biggest winner after China on Monday, taking three more golds to finish second overall with eight. Besides Bespalova's win in the women's 100m butterfly, Russia bagged two golds in judo and fencing. The Russian judokas claimed the men's team title, beating the Netherlands 3-2. World No. 2 fencer Sergej Charikov of Russia beat Italy's Giampiero Pastore in the final of the men's individual sabre fencing. The women's sabre final was also a Russia vs Italy fight, in which Italian Ilaria Bianco defeated Russian Natalia Makeeva 15-10. Finishing after China and Russia in the medal standings are: Japan with seven golds; the United States, 6; Ukraine and Italy, both 5; Cuba, 4; France, 3. |
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