DUSHANBE, December 7, Asia-Plus – The second group of Tajik sportsmen left for Qatar Wednesday night, being a day late, according to the Committee for Youth, Sports and Tourism.
A source at the committee said that the main reason for the delay had been bad weather conditions. “Our sportsmen were scheduled to fly to Doha by a plane of Iran’s air carrier Asman Air on December 5 but because of bad weather conditions the plane failed to arrive in Dushanbe on time,” said the source, “Therefore our sportsmen flew to Tehran, from where they were supposed to get to Qatar, only Wednesday night.”
According to him, the committee’s administration got in touch with Tajik delegation in Qatar to inform them about these problems. “We hope that organizers of the 15
th
Asian Games will meet us half-way and our athletes will be permitted to participate in the competitions,” the source said.
We will recall that more than 100 Tajik sportsmen are competing in 14 sports: taekwon-do; karate-do; athletics; boxing; table tennis; free-style wrestling; judo; soccer, weightlifting, etc. Tajikistan has still won its first medal in the games. On December 5, Tajik wrestler Rasul Boqiyev won the bronze medal, finishing third in the men’s –73 kg judo.
Nearly 12,000 athletes from 45 countries across the Asian continent are competing in the following sports: archery, athletics, badminton, baseball, basketball, body building, bowling, boxing, canoe-kayak, chess, cue sports, cycling, equestrian, fencing, soccer, golf, gymnastics, handball, hockey, judo, kabaddi, karate-do, rowing, rugby, sailing, shooting, soft tennis, squash, table tennis, taekwon-do, tennis, triathlon, volleyball, weightlifting, wrestling and wushu.
