Beijing unlikely to enter 2004 bidding

BEIJING, which lost out to Sydney in the bidding to host the 2000 Olympics, is unlikely to vie for the 2004 Games. Chinese Olympic Committee (COC) chairman Wu Shaozu said yesterday that no Chinese city had yet applied to bid for the 2004 Games with the deadline less than a week away on January 10th.

"Any Olympic bid should be approved by (the) national Olympic committee before it was submitted to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and so far the COC had not received any bid application from any Chinese city," Wu, who is also China's sports minister, said

Earlier, a Chinese sports official told the Reuters news agency it would take months to review a bid, effectively ruling out an application from China. Asked if Beijing would bid, vice-mayor Zhang Baifa said the Chinese capital had other priorities.

"Beijing city is concentrating its energy on drawing up its ninth Five-Year Plan and drafting a development plan for 2010.

Regarding the Olympics, we will actively take part as in the past and actively support it," Zhang said.

A Chinese source close to the Beijing city government said the capital had decided not to compete for the 2004 Olympics. "Like the women's conference, the Olympics would involve much hard work but would produce little results)" the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.

Beijing ran into criticism from many delegates for tight security measures, especially widespread surveillance, during the United Nations World Conference on Women in September.

Chinese sports officials said a formal announcement on whether Beijing would bid for the 2004 Olympics would be made before the January 10th deadline.

The IOC has said Beijing is not among 11 cities that have launched formal bids. The contenders so far are Athens, Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Istanbul, Lille, Rio de Janeiro, Rome, Seville, St Petersburg, San Juan and Stockholm.

Beijing narrowly lost the 2000 Games to Sydney after a highly politicised campaign. China was expected to make a new attempt to seek international recognition of its growing power.

With Beijing out of the way, Cape Town is now the front runner for the 2004 vote. No African city has ever hosted the Olympics and IOC leaders are keen to take the multi-billion sporting spectacle to new areas - especially those expected to have booming economies.