Friendship and cooperation with Samaranch and the IOC
21 November 2000 – Monte Carlo - After Sunday evening’s World Athletics Gala 2000, which will take place in the Salle des Etoiles of the Monte Carlo Sporting Club, all of the members of the IAAF Council will transfer to Lausanne for their last meeting of the year 2000. The meeting will take place on Monday 27 November, Tuesday 28th and if necessary continue through to Wednesday 29 November.
This is only the second time that the IAAF Council has met in the Swiss city, home to the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee. The first was in March 1992, when the then President, Primo Nebiolo, was nominated a member of the IOC by Juan Antonio Samaranch.
With this second trip to Lausanne, which will be a major working session for all of the Council, there is a particular wish to underline the close ties that link athletics – the sport around which the ancient Olympics were born and the cornerstone of the development of the modern edition – and the body founded by Pierre de Coubertin over a century ago.
Throughout this period, public opinion has seen the Olympics and Athletics as expressions of a like ideal and, indeed, the development of the two movements and their modernisation have followed substantially similar aims and philosophies.
The IAAF Council, headed by President Lamine Diack, intends by this gesture to show the gratitude of the World Athletics Family to IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch for the respect and recognition that he has always shown for the work and independence of the International Federation.
The Council session, which will take place in the IOC headquarters, has an extremely full agenda, mostly concerning the activities for 2001, which will be a particularly busy year: 9-11 March, 8th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Lisbon; 24-25 March, 29th IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Dublin; 12-15 July, 2nd IAAF World Youth Championships in Debrecen, Hungary; 3-12 August, 8th IAAF World Championships in Athletics, Edmonton, Canada; 9 September, 17th IAAF Grand Prix Final, Melbourne; 7 October, 10th IAAF World Half Marathon Championships, Bristol, Great Britain.
