The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has formed an expert group to guide the ad-hoc boxing taskforce set up to organise and oversee the qualification and boxing competition at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics following the suspension of world boxing body (AIBA).
The expert group will give recommendations to be considered by the taskforce “predominantly regarding competition rules for the upcoming series of qualification events and test events in the lead up to the Olympic Games.” The first meeting of expert group is on September 11 in Lausanne, Switzerland. Boxing Federation of India (BFI) executive director Rajkumar Sacheti has been invited to be part of the expert group.
The five-member boxing taskforce of IOC Members is chaired by Morinari Watanabe, the President of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG).
In May, the IOC suspended the International Boxing Association (AIBA) and stripped off its right to organise the boxing competition at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The Tokyo Olympics qualification programme finalised by AIBA was also scrapped which resulted in the 2019 World Championships losing its qualification status.
The taskforce recently announced a new qualification programme that will consist of four continental events and a final world qualification event to be held between February and May 2020.
AIBA has been under IOC scanner for several years as it was reeling under deep crisis related to its finances, governance and refereeing standards. AIBA’s relationship with the IOC got further strained when it elected controversial Gafur Rakhimov as president in November, despite IOC warning against such a move. The Uzbek is on a United States sanctions list for his alleged involvement in heroin trade.
First Published:
Sep 09, 2019 21:48 IST
Source: HindustanTimes