Digital Desk: Organisers announced
on Tuesday that China will host the 2022 Asian Games in 2023, delaying the
tournament from Hangzhou due to Covid. The Olympic Council of Asia (OCA)
announced that the 2023 Games will now take place in Hangzhou from September 23
to October 8 of that year.
The event was initially slated to
take place in September of this year, but organisers postponed it in May as
China attempted to quell a significant Covid comeback in a number of regions of
the country. Shanghai, the largest metropolis in the nation, was placed under a
months-long lockdown earlier this year as part of the Communist Party's
zero-tolerance policy against the virus. Hangzhou is fewer than 200 kilometres
(120 miles) from Shanghai.
The revised dates were decided,
according to the OCA on Tuesday, to "prevent clash with other significant
international sporting events."
Typically, more than 10,000 competitors from the region
compete in the Asian Games.
China is the last big economy devoted to stopping the
internal spread of the virus through rigorous travel restrictions, widespread
testing, and lockdowns.
The world's most populous country, however, has had to
cancel or postpone practically all events since the pandemic began, with the
exception of this year's Winter Olympics in Beijing. This has harmed the
country's worldwide athletic goals.
The World University Games, which were originally slated to
start in Chengdu in June but were already postponed from the previous year,
have now been delayed once more until 2023.
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