The Government of Japan and the organizing committee of the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 avoided evaluating this Tuesday the announced decision by North Korea of not attending the sporting event scheduled for next summer due to the covid-19 pandemic.

The Tokyo organizing committee said, in a statement, be aware of the announced decision on the eve through the page North Korean Sports Department website, and recalled that it is the responsibility of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to invite each national Olympic committee to the Games. “We continue working with all parties involved to prepare the best possible scenario to receive athletes from all countries and regions “, indicated those responsible for the organization.

The spokesman minister of the Japanese Executive, Katsunobu Kato, said today at a press conference that North Korea’s participation is an issue “a coordinate between the organizing committee and the IOC, “and that the Government” is closely monitoring it. “Kato also pointed out that the Executive of Japan” continues to do efforts to improve the situation, which includes measures against covid so that they can participate many regions and countries in the games”.

The Pyongyang refusal to participate in the Games became known through the North Korean Sports Department website, which reported on the results of the assembly of the Olympic Committee of the Asian country held on March 25 in which said resolution was adopted. “At the general assembly, the Olympic Committee of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (official name of the country) decided not to participate in the thirty-second Olympic Games in order to protect athletes from global health crisis caused by a malignant viral infection“, explains the note.

Following this meeting of the North Korean Olympic Committee held on March 25 and publicized by the propaganda media of the Pyongyang regime, many experts suspected that North Korea would cancel its participation in the Games based on its strict quarantine and isolation system. .

In March 2018, before the pandemic forced to delay the Tokyo Games initially scheduled for the summer of 2020, the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, expressed in a meeting with the IOC President, Thomas Bach, his wish that athletes from their country will participate in the Olympic event. That meeting took place during the beginning of the diplomatic thaw between the two Koreas, In the framework of which Seoul and Pyongyang also proposed to participate in four Olympic categories with unified teams of athletes from both countries.

But all these initiatives have been left in the air due to extreme level of imprisonment triggered by North Korea as a result of the pandemic and also due to the stagnation of the inter-Korean dialogue, which Seoul hoped to unblock on the occasion of the Games.

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