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The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced on Tuesday a decision to postpone the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo until next year, the IOC press service said in a statement.

TASS news agency reminds that the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo were scheduled to be held between July 24 and August 9.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Thomas Bach, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), held a telephone conversation on Tuesday discussing the expediency of organizing the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo this summer in view of the COVID-19 continuous global spread.

"In the present circumstances and based on the information provided by the WHO today, the IOC President and the Prime Minister of Japan have concluded that the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo must be rescheduled to a date beyond 2020 but not later than summer 2021, to safeguard the health of the athletes, everybody involved in the Olympic Games and the international community," the statement reads.
"President Bach and Prime Minister Abe expressed their shared concern about the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, and what it is doing to people’s lives and the significant impact it is having on global athletes’ preparations for the Games," according to the statement.