Oman Withdraws from hosting 2016 Youth Worlds

(February 29, 2016) – World Sailing is disappointed to announce that the Oman Sailing Committee have withdrawn from hosting the 2016 Youth Sailing World Championships which were due to take place in December 2016.

The Oman Sailing Committee was able to exercise the right to withdraw, as a final contract for the hosting of the event had not been concluded. World Sailing will now immediately start to work with its Member National Authorities to rapidly identify an alternative venue for the 2016 Youth Sailing World Championships at the same time of year as the event originally planned for Oman.

Following the publication of the World Sailing statement on Discrimination on the 13 January 2016, World Sailing can now confirm that it has received written confirmation from all venues that have already been selected and confirmed for forthcoming World Sailing championships that they are able to guarantee full and equal participation by all, in accordance with World Sailing’s Regulations.

World Sailing’s action follows the clarification of the non-discrimination elements of the Olympic Charter from the International Olympic Committee Summit on 17 October 2015, that, “the Summit agreed that for all competitions taking place under the auspices of an International Federation or National Olympic Committee or their continental or regional associations, it has to be ensured that all athletes from all their members can enter a country to compete and are treated equally. It was agreed that should this rule not be respected, the event in question cannot serve as a qualification event for the Olympic Games or any other championship.”

World Sailing confirms it will continue to apply this guidance strictly to all of its future World Sailing championships and explicit acceptance of these conditions will form part of the bid criteria for future events.

Source: World Sailing

Note: I have told anyone with ears that it is a blessing the 2016 and 2017 Youth Sailing World Championships had been scheduled for Oman and Israel, respectively. Following the debacle at the 2015 Worlds in Malaysia where the Israeli boardsailors were unable to compete, it was critical for World Sailing’s policy stance on discrimination to be immediately tested, to see if it had teeth. From the withdrawal of Oman, we have learned two things. One is quite good, the other quite sad. – Craig Leweck, Scuttlebutt editor