The IOC has "added a long-overdue anti-discrimination clause to its host contract in the wake of Russia’s anti-gay law that was a controversial cloud over the Sochi Games," according to John Powers of the BOSTON GLOBE. While equal-rights language "already is in the Olympic Charter, it hasn’t been spelled out in the IOC’s agreement with cities." That new rule "wouldn’t be a problem with Norway but would be were China or Kazakhstan" chosen to host the '22 Winter Games (BOSTON GLOBE, 9/30). In Chicago, Philip Hersh wrote the addition of the clause "is philosophically the most significant so far" on the part of the IOC. The three '22 candidate cities -- Beijing, Oslo, Norway and Almaty, Kazakhstan -- "were told about the changes in a Sept. 16 letter" signed by IOC Sports Dir Christophe Dubi and IOC Dir of Legal Affairs Howard Stupp. The key now will be to "see what kind of hammer the IOC can wield should a country pass discriminatory laws, as Russia did, after one of its cities has been chosen as an Olympic host." Enforcing the contract with the threat of losing the Olympics "becomes nearly impossible in the final three years before the Games in question" (CHICAGO TRIBUNE, 9/25).
