CHENNAI: North Korea has decided not to compete in the Asian Wrestling Championships in New Delhi from February 18-23. Their only flight to India has a stopover in Beijing. A squad of 16 wrestlers and officials had earlier applied for visas to participate in the competition.“The Indian government has issued visas to members of the North Korea squad but they have decided to skip the event. The country doesn’t want to risk its athletes to coronavirus, as their only India-bound flight has a stopover in Beijing,” a Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) official told this daily.
More than 500 wrestlers and officials from 26 countries were expected to arrive in the country for the event. But the mayhem the outbreak has created might see a drop in the number of participants. As of now, the Korean team seems to be the first casualty.Meanwhile, uncertainty over participation of wrestlers from Pakistan and China continues, with less than a week remaining before the delegations start arriving. As per the schedule, the teams will start arriving in the country from February 16.
“WFI president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh met the home minister on Monday and requested him to expedite the process of issuing visas to the teams from China and Pakistan. We will try our best to ensure that these teams get visas. We are quite optimistic of Pakistan’s participation. As far as Chinese wrestlers are concerned, they have to follow the travel health advisory issued by the Indian government in the wake of the medical emergency.
Our responsibility is to help them in procuring visas. We last heard from them around five days ago, when the Chinese federation’s office-bearers called and enquired about the visa status,” said the WFI official.The Indian High Commission in Islamabad had accepted passports and visa applications of the Pakistani wrestlers last week. A total of four wrestlers and two officials from Pakistan are expected to arrive if they get visas.