The brutal toll on human life resulting from this month's commuter train bombings in Madrid only magnifies the daunting security tasks ahead for two European nations that will host major sports events this summer.
While the focus has been Athens and the Olympic Games in August, the world's second-largest soccer tournament behind the World Cup, UEFA's Euro 2004, is scheduled for June 12-July 4 in cities throughout Portugal, Spain's neighbor. Portuguese officials announced last week that the nation's elite security forces would be assigned to protect each of the 16 teams in Euro 2004.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency's top counterterrorism strategist was dispatched to meet with Games organizers in Athens.
Visible and covert precautions must still be taken, but in an interview with SportsBusiness Journal, a terrorism expert said the likelihood that a security response will be required has probably increased.
"We are just dealing with a different world now," said Bruce Hoffman of The Rand Corp., an Arlington, Va., nonprofit research and analysis center. "The repercussions from something like [Madrid] are profound. What Madrid obviously shows is that terrorists do have the capacity to strike in Europe. So [future attack threats] are less theoretical, more probable than hypothetical."
"X" FACTOR LOOMS: Xerox Corp., 40-year sponsor of the Olympic Games, remains interested in forging a U.S. Olympic team deal for 2005-2008 even as it approaches the end of its global Olympic marketing contract at the end of the year.
"We're looking into that possibility but have made no decision," said Terry Dillman, manager of worldwide Olympic marketing at Xerox.
The company announced in October that it would not renew its contractual status as worldwide sponsor under the category of document publishing/services/supplies. Xerox has held those rights since 1994 but has been a supplier to the Games since 1964.
"Every time we get together we talk about how we need to move forward [with talks]," said the U.S. Olympic Committee's sponsorship broker Rob Prazmark, president of IMG Olympic sales.
A major hurdle for Xerox is that the International Olympic Committee must first eliminate document publishing as a global sponsor category.
EUROS FROM HEAVEN: The security chief of the privately financed Athens Metro said he finally has reason to breathe easier with the countdown to the Athens Games closing in. Five days after a March 7 national election transferred power to the former minority political party in Greece, Dimosthenes Giannissopoulos received a pledge from the newly installed minister of transportation for about two-thirds of funding — about $8.6 million — needed to bolster security measures across the subway system leading to and during the Games this summer.
"We have an agreement," said Giannissopoulos in an interview by telephone from Athens. "[It was] a very fast response."
Despite the funding windfall, he warned: "I am not going to get help on a central detection system for chemicals [bioterrorism]. There is no time to install it. We wasted 3 ½ years."
The Athens Metro, operational since January 2000, is expected to be a crucial transportation option for visitors attending and working at the Games, including sponsors and guests looking for escapes from traffic-snarled roads. It is projected the system will handle 1.2 million passengers daily Aug. 13-29, double its typical load.
Despite the absence of a chemical-agent detection system, the security chief outlined an array of new technology that is now due for installation, including bomb-proof trash cans, portable bomb and chemical-detection units for guards, and railcar scanners. Surveillance cameras already have been doubled to 400.
NO, THANKS: As a result of the perplexing inability by Athens Olympic organizers to provide information about a major pre-Games competition at the Olympic swimming venue, USA Swimming canceled plans to send a delegation of swimmers, coaches and staff to Greece for the spring test event.
USA Swimming vice president Rod Davis said the organizing committee, ATHOC, did not acknowledge requests for a formal invitation.
"We were concerned about putting our athletes in a situation where we could not organize [travel plans] to our standards," said USA Swimming national team director Everett Uchiyama. "There were quite a few factors involved."
The decision came even before organizers announced the dates of the test event would be delayed about 30 days until May. The central cause of that delay, a shade roof, later vanished when the Greek government first said a planned permanent roof was no longer an option and would be replaced by a temporary roof. Ultimately, an advisory was e-mailed March 20 that there would be no roof of any kind. All of this occurred over the course of four days.
A USOC spokesman said no other sports federations have skipped Athens test events.
Steve Woodward can be reached at swoodward@sportsbusinessjournal.com.
