Paris 2024 Olympics: Condoms for athletes, but no champagne – organisers hope Games can unite a world in conflict
Olympic chiefs hope a world divided by coronavirus and conflict can be united by cardboard and condoms.
In the city of love – with pandemic-era Olympic restrictions over – Paris 2024 is encouraging amour among athletes again.
After the keys were handed over, Sky News joined Games chiefs on inspections of the Olympic Village that will welcome 9,000 athletes in July.
In the accommodation we were shown the surprising bed frame – cardboard. Sturdy enough, apparently, to support 250kg of Olympian – or Olympians.
And we were told 300,000 condoms will be available in the Olympic Village – enough for almost two each for every day of the Games.
Mixing among nations is very much encouraged again with the creation of a Village Club, after social distancing orders at the last summer Games in Tokyo in 2021 and an intimacy ban from the International Olympic Committee.
A room prepared for athletes inside the Olympic and Paralympic Village
“It is very important that the conviviality here is something big,” Laurent Michaud, director of the village, told Sky News.
“Working with the athletes commission, we wanted to create some places where the athletes would feel very enthusiastic and comfortable.”
But while a French staple is off the menu in the village there will be plenty to ensure athletes are well-nourished and refreshed.
“No champagne in the village, of course, but they can have all the champagne they want also in Paris,” said Mr Michaud, who previously ran Center Parcs in France.
“We will have more than 350 metres of buffet with the world food… and I’m sure that the athletes will be very happy to have some French specialties made over here.
“But the variety will first respond to the athletes’ needs for their nutrition and their performance.”
The Olympic Village is the single costliest Olympic project at €2bn (£1.7bn) but largely funded by property investors.
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Inside the Paris Olympic village
Around €650m of public funds have also been used for the project that regenerates this deprived area of Saint-Denis near the Stade de France.
The size of 70 football pitches, the village is split by the River Seine with a bridge to link the accommodation blocks.
For the IOC it is about avoiding white elephant projects of the past – ensuring host cities are not left with vast infrastructure built for the Olympics that has little lasting legacy.
“It’s about a responsible Games delivering less complex Games, which means less costly Games, and that’s very important because we have to be cost conscious in today’s world,” IOC member Pierre-Olivier Beckers-Vieujant, the Paris 2024 Olympic coordination commission chair, told Sky News.
“It’s a project where 95% of the venues would be either existing or temporary. So in itself, Paris had to build a very limited number of venues and or infrastructure, all of them being needed by the region, like the various infrastructure of the village here.”
There are little signs yet across Paris the Games are coming – the most visible indicators are the additional CCTV cameras being installed.
Changes to the law were required to allow AI video surveillance to be used to identify potential threats with the security concerns heightened amid the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
But organisers are still determined to take events into the heart of Paris.
The opening ceremony will be staged down the River Seine with the athletes parading on a flotilla of boats, although the terror threat has curtailed ticket availability from viewing positions.
How the opening ceremony could look. Pic: Paris 2024
Pic: Paris 2024
Urban sports will be at Place de la Concorde at the end of the Champs-Elysees, including the debut of breaking, BMX freestyle and skateboarding.
And the city’s most iconic venue – the Eiffel Tower – will be a stunning setting for beach volleyball.
Olympic Games executive director Christophe Dubi told Sky News: “This incredible city backdrop comes with the challenge of having this concentration of people over what is in the end a pretty small footprint.”
But it is a welcome challenge after spectators were banned from Tokyo’s venues in 2021 due to the pandemic and Rio 2016 struggled to attract large capacities.
The crowds should be back in force for the first time since London 2012 and the most tickets outside of France have been sold to fans in Britain.
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“It has to be a celebration and it is a celebration – we’ve had many challenges in the past,” Mr Dubi said.
“In Rio we faced situations that were amazingly complex. But what you see is that with a bit of goodwill from everyone – starting with the organisers, but also as far as the Olympic community is concerned – meeting with the challenges and coming up with solutions… is in the greater interest that the Games represent.
“What we all want is for unity, peace and a celebration of the best athletes. This is how this creative family works together.
“Any challenge? We will win.”
A new aid system has opened its first distribution centres in Gaza, according to a US-backed organisation dealing with supplies.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began its operations in the territory on Monday, following the resignation of its director, Jake Wood, over its independence.
Gaza’s 2.3m population has been pushed towards famine by Israel’s almost three-month blockade.
Boxes of aid to be distributed across Rafah. Pic: Reuters.
The GHF said lorryloads of food – it did not say how many – had been delivered to its hubs, and distribution to Palestinians had begun.
“More trucks with aid will be delivered tomorrow, with the flow of aid increasing each day,” it said in a statement.
The controversial group, backed by Israel and the United States, has been rejected by the United Nations and other aid groups.
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People line up for food in Gaza
UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF.
They claim Israel is weaponising food, and the new distribution system will be ineffective and lead to further displacement of Palestinians.
They also argue the GHF will fail to meet local needs, and violates humanitarian principles that prohibit a warring party from controlling humanitarian assistance.
In the meantime, scores of Palestinians in Gaza, like Islam Abu Taima, have resorted to searching through rubbish to find food.
Palestinians are having to search through rubbish to find food
She found a small pile of cooked rice, scraps of bread, and a box with a few pieces of cheese inside it – which she said she will serve to her five children.
“We’re dying of hunger,” she told the Associated Press news agency.
“If we don’t eat, we’ll die.”
Islam Abu Taeima finds a piece of bread in a pile of rubbish in Gaza City. Pic: AP.
It is unclear how many of the GHF’s aid trucks will enter Gaza.
It claims it will reach one million Palestinians by the end of the week.
There are questions, however, over who is funding it and how it will work.
Trucks transporting aid for Palestinians in Rafah. Pic: Reuters.
It has been set up as part of an Israeli plan – rather than a UN distribution effort.
Israel, which suggested a similar plan earlier this year, has said it will not be involved in distributing the aid but supported the plan and would provide security.
It says aid deliveries into Gaza are taken by Hamas instead of going to civilians.
Aid groups, however, say there is no evidence of this happening on a systemic basis.
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Israel began to allow a limited amount of food into Gaza last week – after a blockade that prevented food, medicine, fuel and other goods from entering the Palestinian enclave.
A letter has been signed by hundreds of judges and lawyers calling on the UK government to impose trade sanctions on Israel.
It also calls for Israeli ministers to be sanctioned and the suspension of Israel from the UN over “serious breaches of international law”.
“Genocide is being perpetrated in Gaza or that, at a minimum, there is a serious risk of genocide,” the letter says.
The Israeli government has repeatedly dismissed allegations of genocide in Gaza.
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At least 31 dead after school attack
More than 52,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its ground invasion of Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, following the deadly attacks by the militant group on Israel, which killed 1,200 people and saw around 250 people taken hostage.
The health ministry’s figures do not differentiate between civilians and fighters in Gaza.
King Charles and Queen Camilla are being urged to use their visit to Canada to seek an apology for the abuse of British children.
Campaigners have called on them to pursue an apology for the “dire circumstances” suffered by so-called “Home Children” over decades.
More than 100,000 were shipped from orphan homes in the UK to Canada between 1869 and 1948 with many used as cheap labour, typically as farm workers and domestic servants. Many were subject to mistreatment and abuse.
Canada has resisted calls to follow the UK and Australia in apologising for its involvement in child migrant schemes.
King Charles and Mark Carney on Monday. Pic: PA
Campaigners for the Home Children say the royal visit presents a “great opportunity” for a change of heart.
“I would ask that King Charles uses his trip to request an apology,” John Jefkins told Sky News.
John’s father Bert was one of 115,000 British Home Children transported to Canada, arriving in 1914 with his brother Reggie.
“It’s really important for the Home Children themselves and for their descendants,” John said.
“It’s something we deserve and it’s really important for the healing process, as well as building awareness of the experience of the Home Children.
“They were treated very, very badly by the Canadian government at the time. A lot of them were abused, they were treated horribly. They were second-class citizens, lepers in a way.”
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John Jefkins
John added: “I think the King’s visit provides a great opportunity to reinforce our campaign and to pursue an apology because we’re part of the Commonwealth and King Charles is a new Head of the Commonwealth meeting a new Canadian prime minister. It’s a chance, for both, to look at the situation with a fresh eye.
“There’s much about this visit that looks on our sovereignty and who we are as Canadians, rightly so.
“I think it’s also right that in contemplating the country we built, we focus on the people who built it, many in the most trying of circumstances.”
The issue was addressed by the then Prince of Wales during a tour of Canada in May 2022. He said at the time: “We must find new ways to come to terms with the darker and more difficult aspects of the past.”
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King Charles and Queen Camilla are on a two-day visit to Canada.
On Tuesday, the King will deliver the Speech from the Throne to open the 45th session of Canada’s parliament.
Camilla was made Patron of Barnardo’s in 2016. The organisation sent tens of thousands of Home Children to Canada. She took on the role, having served as president since 2007.
Buckingham Palace has been contacted for comment.
A spokesperson for the Canadian government said: “The government of Canada is committed to keeping the memory of the British Home Children alive.
“Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada deeply regrets this unjust and discriminatory policy, which was in place from 1869 to 1948. Such an approach would have no place in modern Canada, and we must learn from past mistakes.”
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