Vice Prime Minister Jorge Luis Perdomo Di-Lellade, the head of the Cuban Olympic Committee, Roberto León Richards, and the president of the National Sports Institute, Osvaldo Vento, received Bach and his delegation on his arrival to the José Martí airport.
They also greeted the senior manager and the president of Panam Sports, Chilean Neven Ilic, the Olympic champions Mijaín López, a Greco-Roman style fighter, the former volleyball player Yumilka Ruiz and the former javelin thrower María Claridad Colón, the latter a member of the IOC.
Bach expressed satisfaction for returning to Cuba several decades after his first stay, praised the results of sports on the island, and expressed his confidence that it will continue in the world elite for Paris 2024 and Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.
For his part, Perdomo Di-lella expressed the high significance of Bach’s visit for the Cuban Government and people, and reiterated the absolute priority that sports have for the authorities of this Antillean nation.
Today Bach and his delegation will participate in a meeting of the Cuban Olympic Committee at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba and will witness the official opening of a basketball surface donated by Panam Sports.
For tomorrow, the program’s most outstanding activity is attendance to the Pan-American Stadium of this capital for the inauguration of an athletics track also donated by the highest Panam sports entity.
The arrival of Thomas Bach in Havana is the third of an IOC head to visit Cuba in 60 years. The two previous presidents of said institution, the Spanish Juan Antonio Samaranch and the Belgian Jacques Rogge, were in Cuba during their mandates.
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