Olympic Committees of CIS and Baltic States unite

Officials from ten National Olympic Committees from the Commonwealth of Independent States attended a conference of the Association of National Olympic Committees /ANOC/ of the CIS and Baltic States, which took place in Chisinau during the weekend.

The motto of the conference was "Our Strength Is Our Unity." Participants listened to reports about athletes' preparations for the 2004 Olympics in Athens, cooperation within the ANOC framework, the current state of sports medicine, and doping control.

It was pointed out that officials from the CIS and Baltic states who happen to be members of the world's leading sports organizations have to join efforts to uphold their positions concerning refereeing, regulating and calendar-keeping of sports events.

Participants in the meeting welcomed enthusiastically the announcement that Russia was ready to conduct joint gatherings of the Commonwealth's leading athletes on its sports premises.

It was decided, following a proposal from Emzar Zenaishvili of the National Olympic Committee of Georgia, to hold an ANOC conference on doping control in Tbilisi this fall.