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Beijing ready to showcase crucial bidding presentation to IOC

Xinhua, June 8, 2015 Adjust font size:

Candidate cities Almaty (Kazakhstan) and Beijing (China) will present their respective bidding projects on Tuesday to International Olympic Committee (IOC) members in the Swiss city of Lausanne in a bid to clinch the 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.

June 9 will see both delegations conduct presentations and answering questions in the Olympic Museum, while further 2022 candidate city promotional activities will be held to IOC members on June 10.

Beijing is now entering the final stages of a process which may see China's capital become the first city ever to host both summer and winter Olympic Games.

Formally announcing its bid to the IOC as a candidate city in November 2013, the Beijing 2022 Olympic Games Bid Committee was set-up in January 2014 after being approved by the State Council, and was one of the three cities selected by the IOC's Executive Board on July 7, 2014.

Oslo (Norway) subsequently withdrew its candidacy later that year, leaving only Almaty and Beijing in the bidding race.

Building on Beijing's 2008 summer Olympics, which "contributed significantly to the development of the Olympic Movement and the spread of Olympic values," according to Beijing Olympic Games Bidding Committee, China hopes to bring the Winter Olympics to the country for the first time.

The Bidding Committee has expressed its commitment to prioritising the athletes' wellbeing above all else, while ensuring sustainable development and supporting pragmatic economic planning.

According to the 2022 Evaluation Commission's report released earlier this month, Beijing seeks to incorporate winter sports into people's lives, which will ultimately improve overall fitness and health, while offering a regional concept intended to develop a winter sports market for over 300 million people in China.

Beijing and the nearby Yanqing and Zhangjiakou will be used to host different events, and half of the 12 projected venues already exist.

"If the Winter Olympics are as slick as the Beijing Summer Olympics, then it will be a superb event," Local Government Official Mark Pemberton, from the UK, told Xinhua.

Particularly remembering the superb architecture of the Bird's Nest stadium, he thought that it was an "excellent idea to use some of the 2008 facilities, and that working on different sites is not a problem given China's efficiency."

The Lausanne-based meetings, taking place on June 9-10 are crucial in influencing the IOC ahead of the final July 31st vote taking place during the committee's 128th session in Kuala Lumpur this year.

Out of the 101 members entitled to vote in July's ballot, around 85 will be present in Lausanne this week, where country delegations will be able to showcase their respective projects in the city's Olympic Museum and Palace Hotel. Endt