IOC President Bach welcomed by French President Macron in Paris

08 Jun 2023 – The President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach, was welcomed by French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday at the Élysée Palace in Paris. The two leaders discussed the preparations for the Olympic Games Paris 2024, which are going extremely well. President Bach and President Macron expressed their full support for the Organising Committee and its President, Olympic champion Tony Estanguet, who also attended the meeting.

The Olympic Games Paris 2024 will be Games of a new era, taking the reforms of Olympic Agenda 2020 and Olympic Agenda 2020+5 fully into account. The “Games wide open” slogan will fully come to life at these Games. Paris 2024 will be the most inclusive Olympic Games, the most urban Olympic Games, the youngest Olympic Games, the most sustainable Olympic Games and the most gender-balanced Olympic Games in history, with full parity of female and male athletes.

President Bach thanked President Macron for the recent declaration at the G7 Summit in Hiroshima, Japan, concerning the autonomy of sport and the conditions for the participation of athletes with a Russian or Belarussian passport, in alignment with the respective recommendations of the IOC.

In addition, they reaffirmed that the decision on the participation of these athletes at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 will be taken by the IOC at the appropriate time, and that they will continue to cooperate in this respect, too.