Wikipedia

2023 Winter Deaflympics

The 2023 Winter Deaflympics, officially known as the 20th Winter Deaflympics or XX Winter Deaflympics, was the 20th edition of the Winter Deaflympics, and took place between 2–12 March 2024 in Erzurum in Turkey.[1][2]

20th Winter Deaflympics
Host cityErzurum
 Turkey
Nations34
Athletes534 (314 men and 220 women)
Events6 sports
Opening2 March 2024
Closing12 March 2024
Winter
Summer

The multi-sport event was originally planned to be held in 2023, but the event was pushed towards the early part of March 2024 due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The 2023 edition of the Winter Deaflympics was the third largest international sporting event to be held in Erzurum after the city had previously hosted the 2011 Winter Universiade and 2017 European Youth Olympic Winter Festival.[3] United States of America, Sweden, Canada and Finland boycotted the games due to security concerns and geopolitical tensions surrounding West Asia.[4] Israel also withdrew from the competition due to Turkey's souring diplomatic relations with Israel over the Israel-Gaza tensions.[2]

Six sports were included in the final list of games programme including alpine skiing, chess, cross-country skiing, curling, futsal, and snowboarding. Futsal made its debut at the 2024 Winter Deaflympics.[5] Ice hockey, which was initially slotted by the organizers in the draft plan of the games, had to be scrapped from the agenda of action items due to the withdrawal of the United States of America, Sweden, Canada, and Finland.[4]

Approximately 534 athletes from 34 countries competed at the games and a total of 102 medals were felicitated to the athletes in across all sports.[3] Eight countries including Algeria, Greece, Iran, Ireland, Latvia, Kuwait, Serbia and Thailand made their debuts at the Winter Deaflympics during the course of the multi-sport event.[3] Ukraine topped the medal table during the games with a haul of 10 gold medals and a total of 19 medals were clinched by Ukrainian athletes during the games.[6]

Bidding

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Reports surfaced in 2018 over the formal launch of bidding processes by the International Committee of Sports for the Deaf to choose the official host cities for both 2021 Summer Deaflympics and 2023 Winter Deaflympics.[7] ICSD marked 1 July 2019 as the deadline for the bidding proposals to be submitted by the interested nations in order to finalise the host cities for both 2021 Summer Deaflympics and 2023 Winter Deaflympics.[7]

The International Committee of Sports for the Deaf revealed that their bidding project for the conduct of both events had been formulated in line with the core principles used by the International Olympic Committee’s Agenda 2020.[7]

Participating nations[8]

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In a press conference, Erzurum Governor Mustafa Çiftçi confirmed that the USA had withdrawn from taking part at the 20th Winter Deaflympics owing to the Israel-Palestinian conflict in the Middle East region and due to the political stance of the USA on Israel-Gaza tensions.[4]

References

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  1. ^ "Winter Deaflympics 2024". www.deaflympics.com. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  2. ^ a b AA, Daily Sabah with (2024-02-16). "Turkish deaf sports ring in excitement for hosting 20th Deaflympics". Daily Sabah. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  3. ^ a b c "Ukraine tops the medals table at the 20th Winter Deaflympics in Turkey". Inside the Games. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  4. ^ a b c Minute, Turkish (2024-01-25). "US, 3 others skip Olympics for deaf athletes in eastern Turkey due to security concerns". Turkish Minute. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  5. ^ "Croatia wins first medal at Winter Deaflympics in Turkey". Croatia Week. 2024-03-04. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  6. ^ "Ukraine wins the Winter Deaflympics for the first time in history, winning a record 19 medals | УНН". unn.ua. 2024-11-20. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  7. ^ a b c "Cities invited to bid for 2021 Summer and 2023 Winter Deaflympics". Inside the Games. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
  8. ^ "Erzurum 2024". www.deaflympics.com. Retrieved 2024-11-21.
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