SportAccord meeting moved away from Beijing due to coronavirus

[February 13, 2020]    BERLIN (Reuters) - The SportAccord World Sport and Business Summit has been moved away from Beijing due to the coronavirus outbreak in China, organisers said on Thursday.

Workers wearing face masks clean a shopping mall following an outbreak of the novel coronavirus in the country, in Beijing's central business district, China February 12, 2020. China Daily via REUTERS

The international conference, which attracts top sports administrators, international sports federations, Olympic officials, sponsors and major sports organisers among others, was to be held in the Chinese capital from April 19-24.

Organisers have yet to decide on a new location for the event.

It is the latest in a growing list of sports events and meetings that have been affected by the spread of the virus.

"Considering the epidemic in China and around the world... we have reached a difficult decision that SportAccord 2020 will not take place in Beijing," SportAccord President Raffaele Chiulli said in a statement.

He said efforts were being made to move the event to a different location on the same dates.

The virus, first discovered in December in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province, has killed more than 1,300 people in the country.

Across mainland China, there were 15,152 new confirmed infections on Wednesday, bringing the total number to 59,805.

(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann; Editing by Toby Davis)

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