(ATR) Kazakhstan’s president has raised the possibility of Almaty co-hosting the 2022 Olympics with Astana.
Nursultan Nazarbayev spoke about the Olympic bid in his annual end-of-year news conference Sunday, noting concerns about costs voiced by the public and suggesting an approach might be made to the IOC to include the capital Astana as an event host.
"Almaty has lots of necessary sports facilities already in place, like a skating rink, Alpine skiing facilities, a world-class ski jumping hill and a hockey stadium," he was quoted by the Astana Times, adding that only an Olympic Village and bobsleigh track needed to be built along with upgrades to the road infrastructure.
"If the International Olympic Committee allows, Astana would also be ready to host part of the events. We are not going to spend 50 or 40 or 30 billion dollars. There will be expenses, but we can manage them," Nazarbayev said.
Nazarbayev may have been seeking to take advantage of the IOC’s newly-approved bidding reforms, which would allow more than one city to host Olympic events in "exceptional circumstances" – if there are clear financial and legacy reasons for doing so.
However, the IOC is likely to frown on any formal approach from the Almaty 2022 bid – the city is around 1,000 km from Astana, which appears to go against the IOC’s sustainability rule and would disperse the Games over too wide an area.
With Almaty and bidding rival Beijing due to hand over their 2022 bid dossiers to the IOC by Jan. 7, aspokesperson for the Almaty bid tells ATR their bid book is finished everything is on track.
"We plan to win and [are] working hard to make it happen."
Beijing On Track
The Chinese bid committee tells Around the Rings that Beijing’s preparations are advancing well.
"A team of officials, scholars and experts, with rich experience in running the successful Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics, have spent the last several months working on the best and most detailed response to each of the IOC’s requirements regarding the Winter Olympic Games," a bid spokeswoman said.
The Beijing 2022 candidature file is now at the printers, ATR is told.
"The bid committee looks forward to handing it over to the IOC in Lausanne on January 7, and is fully confident that the candidature file will meet the IOC’s demands," she said.
"The Beijing 2022 bid committee pledges that all government financial guarantees required by the IOC are fully in place," the spokeswoman added. "Beijing 2022 is determined to host an athlete-centered, sustainable and cost-efficient Winter Olympic Games."
Beijing is ramping up promotion of its 2022 bid by staging a range of winter sports events in several cities over the coming months. Earlier this month, it launched a season-long program of winter sports activities that runs until July 2015, when the IOC host city vote takes place in Kuala Lumpur.
This weekend, Beijing’s Bird’s Nest stadium, venue for the ceremonies and athletics at the 2008 Games, hosts the Snow & Ice Season for Youth. As the national program designed to raise awareness of the 2022 bid, the city is hosting eight events. Seven events are also being staged in Zhangjiakou, the city over 200km from Beijing that is proposed for some skiing events in the 2022 bid.
Reported by Mark Bisson
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