The Indonesian island of Bali has withdrawn as the host of next month’s 2023 World Beach Games, forcing its cancelation.
The event was due to take place between August 5 and 12, leaving no time for the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) to find a replacement host.
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A new host city for the ANOC General Assembly, which was due to take place alongside the World Beach Games, is expected to be announced later this year.
ANOC said the reason for the Indonesian Olympic Committee’s (KOI) decision was due to the Indonesian government not releasing the budget promised to deliver the event.
In a statement, ANOC said: "ANOC offers its sincere apologies to these national Olympic committees [NOC], athletes, and the International Federations (IFs) who have been committed partners of the event, and to the fans around the world.
“While there have been challenges in the games preparations, as at any major multi-sport event, ANOC had been regularly assured by the KOI that solutions would be found, and the games would go ahead as planned.
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By GlobalData“ANOC and the KOI met for weekly coordination meetings, as recently as last week, and at no point did the KOI indicate there were any issues that would lead to such an outcome.
“ANOC’s immediate priority is to ensure the athletes are supported and the NOCs and IFs are compensated as best as possible in light of the cancellation.”
This will be the second time the biennial event will be canceled, having been postponed from 2021 to allow participating athletes to focus on the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, which was also delayed to 2021 as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Indonesia was approved as the host country for the games in October 2021 at the general assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) and Bali was announced by KOI in June 2022.
Subsequently, an ANOC technical group has worked with the Indonesian Olympic Committee to develop plans for the event.
More than 1,200 athletes from 97 national Olympic committees competed at the inaugural World Beach Games, Qatar 2019, and ANOC said similar figures were to compete from 100 qualified National Olympic Committees this year.
Among the sports to take place were aquathlon, beach handball, beach soccer, beach tennis, beach volley 4×4, beach water polo, beach wrestling, individual kata, expression kiteboarding, and open water swimming.
